Content Redacted: Cipher Nine
by Inyri Ascending
Summary: Prompts and standalone pieces about Nine. Set in the universe of Equivalent Exchange.
1. unbind me

**(Author's Note:** A prompt request: "unbind me," one character freeing the other, featuring Cipher Nine and Kaliyo.)

 **Unbind Me**

 _Nar Shaddaa. 11 ATC._

Her hands are going numb.

She ought to have turned Belan in a month ago- he was slaver scum and treated his girls like trash to be discarded- but on Nar Shaddaa the Hutts were the law and they didn't give a damn about a dozen half-starved Twi'lek slaves. More to the point, the intel he'd fed them on the Cartel ring was too good, her handler'd said. They had to let him be.

She _did_ catch him cooking the books, though, skimming a few thousand credits a month off the profit margin. If that would buy his loyalty to the Empire, she would have let him keep the credits; it would have been a cheaper buyoff than most, and useful informants were getting hard to find.

Except when she went back to the cantina to renegotiate terms, data in hand, he was back in the slave quarters, half-drunk and raging and beating fragile little Sia'hla, his favorite, within an inch of her life. Enough was enough. She went to pull him off-

-but she'd missed the stun baton in his hand, and wakes up an hour later on the floor with a slave collar locked around her neck and her hands bound tight behind her back.

 _Uh-oh._

She wiggles her hands experimentally- rope, not chain, which is something, but the knots feel sturdy. Her neck's throbbing, too; he must've shocked her just for spite. Looking around, the room's empty save for her, a low bed in the corner and a pool of blood in the center of the floor. Not hers, she doesn't think. Not yet, at least.

Two sets of footsteps on the far side of the door- one set of bare feet and a pair of boots. She tries the ropes again- no. She can't get her hands free without dislocating her thumb, a less than ideal option not knowing who's outside. Maybe she can reach her boot knife? She twists again, backward, her muscles cramping in protest.

The door starts open, slowly, and she's about to say _fuck it_ and pop her thumb out of joint when Sia'hla, with two black eyes and her nose still oozing, peers through the gap and gestures frantically behind her.

"Hey, boss." Kaliyo slips through the still-widening door. "You look like shit."

She snorts, which makes her head ache. Some of that blood might be hers, after all. "Get my hands free, 'liyo. He could be back any minute."

As she saws at the rope with her own blade, Kaliyo shakes her head. "I kinda doubt it. You told me to come find you after an hour, and by the looks of it he's been dead at least half that time."

"He- what?"

"Blaster shot to the kidney, close range. That wasn't you?"

"No." The last of the knots severed, she wrings her arms out as the blood flows back toward her fingertips. Oh, that stings. "If he's dead, we may not be alone. We need to figure out who killed him, and I need-"

Sia'hla, still in the doorway, lets out a half-choked little gasp. " _I'm sorry, mistress. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have_ …" She trails off, mumbling in Huttese, and reaches out, a digital key clutched tight in one bruised hand.

She blinks. " _What have you got there?"_ It sounds harsher than she means it to- Huttese is such an ugly language.

The Twi'lek gestures upward at her own throat, at the collar fastened too tight around it. _"For the collars. Master kept it in the lockbox. He told me to put your things in it while he called his friends."_

Kaliyo grabs the key and holds it up against her neck until the slave collar beeps and the lock clicks open. " _I found her shaking in his office and him dead across his desk. Did you see who killed him, little sister?"_ (Kaliyo'd worn a collar once, herself, she'd said, a long time ago. She was pretty sure, unlike most of her stories, that one was actually true.)

" _He told me to put-"_ the girl's repeating herself, stuttering over the words. " _He gave me the gun, and the bigger gun, and_ _I- I didn't think it'd be so loud."_ She finally looks up. " _But you tried to make him stop. No one ever made him stop."_

She rips the key out of Kaliyo's hand and forces herself to her feet, gets across the room in two steps and holds it to the girl's throat. The collar clicks, like hers, and she slowly pulls, an ugly ring of scar tissue showing beneath as the hinge comes open. She must have worn the same one for years.

 _"What are you- no, no, you can't-"_ Hands up against her bare skin, eyes wide, Sia'hla shakes her head furiously. _"They'll think I ran. They'll punish the others."_

"Like hell they will." Tossing the key back across, she tilts her head toward the corridor. "Get the rest of them out here and get their collars off. I'll buy their contracts out myself if I have to, but we need to get them out of here."

Kaliyo nods and slips out.

 _"Mistress?"_ She's still rubbing at her throat.

" _Don't call me that. What's your-"_ what's the word for it in Huttese? It's on the tip of her tongue- " _if I were to buy you, how much would Belan have asked?"_

She shrugs, one lek twitching anxiously. " _He paid five thousand, but I was only eleven then. He would have asked twenty, I think. He-"_ she twitches again. _"I was his favorite."_

Twenty thousand credits. She's been on vacations that cost more- and _eleven?_ Force take this fucking job. She pulls a credit chip out of her pocket. " _Well, then_. _Twenty thousand?"_

 _"Mistress, I-"_

 _"Rule number one, Sia'hla."_ She can hear more voices outside, now, high-pitched and anxious, and the soft beeps of unlocking collars. _"Never use that word again."_


	2. love me

( **Author's Note:** Prompt request: "love me"- a fluffy drabble about two characters. Nine/Theron.)

 **Love Me**

It's not that she doesn't know how to swim.

She learned well enough in her school days, but properly: a swimming pool, indoors, with walls and a bottom you could see. The lakes and oceans of Dromund Kaas were strictly off-limits- lightning storms were a constant and even if one was lucky enough to escape electrocution the water beasts had claws and teeth just as sharp as their terrestrial cousins. Odessen, in contrast, has few predators and even rarer storms, and after hours of scouting in the spring chill the hot spring looks terribly enticing, but-

"It just seems," Nine says, setting the last of her clothes onto the pile beside Theron's and lowering one bare foot tentatively toward the surface of the water, "like a very bad idea."

"Oh, come on." He's already chest-deep and as she watches he dives underwater, emerging a few moments later with steam rising from his skin and hair slicked back to rub the water from his eyes. "See? It's completely safe. No lake monsters or-"

He disappears.

"Very funny, Theron." She pauses, waiting for him to resurface. And waits. And- "Theron?"

She _knew_ this was a bad idea.

After thirty seconds she's actually getting nervous, and she's nearly convinced herself to jump in after him when something latches itself around her ankle and pulls and she goes flying off the edge, landing with an undignified shriek in a tangle of splashing limbs. She flails, righting herself, searches for the bottom with outstretched toes.

The little pool isn't so deep, actually, only up to her shoulders, the bottom solid stone underfoot rather than mud or sand and the water delightfully warm, already drawing the cold out of her half-frozen hands- not so bad, really, except that Theron's still nowhere in sight. Her hairband's come loose; with a shake of her head she clears her hair from her eyes and turns, fingers splayed beneath the surface, searching. "All right. This isn't funny."

"Not even a little?" Somehow he's behind her, arms folded, grinning, water running in little rivulets down his body and- ugh. She can never stay cross with him for very long, not when he looks at her like that. (Or when he looks like that, full stop. One might call it superficial of her and she's guilty as charged, but Force help her, she could study the lines of his shoulders for days.) "You're warmer now, aren't you?"

"I'll admit it does feel nice after all that- wait. Did you plan this?" In retrospect he'd certainly seemed to have a destination in mind, leading down the trails instead of letting her choose the route as he usually did.

Theron nods. "You've been extra tense lately, and short of breaking my fingers on your back muscles I thought this might help you relax. Not exactly a luxury spa, but-" he shrugs- "it's a start. I may also have altered the scouting report a little to keep the secret from getting out, so if you see something about an acid lake feel free to ignore it."

"I assume, per report, it's also full of tentacled horrors?"

"Obviously. I mean, _something_ pulled you in."

"Something. Mm-hm." Unconvinced by his best innocent look (she knows better, by now), she laughs and spreads her arms to the side, tilting backward, and for a moment she's weightless, borne up by the water. Her hands and feet flutter as she tries to keep herself afloat; soon enough, though, she's sinking and she probably just kicked water in Theron's face. "I think I might be bad at this."

He closes the distance between them with a few graceful strokes. "Hang on. Let me-" one hand under her back, the other behind her head, holding her at the surface easily as her hair fans out, a halo in the slow current. "There. Better?"

She nods.

With her ears beneath the surface the noise of the world fades, lulling her into calmness with the slow-shifting movement of Theron's fingertips on her skin. Eyes closed, she drifts, her tension easing, her mind clear, breathing steady and slow-

"Time to wake up," he says, and she opens her eyes again.

"I wasn't-" The sun's half-gone from the sky above them, so she must have been. "Stars, why didn't you say something?"

He half-shrugs, right hand shifting from her back down behind her knees until she's folded against him, still suspended in his arms. "You needed it- relaxation, remember?"

"I must have." She winds her own arms around his neck, turns her head to brush her lips against his chest just above the waterline. "You're a darling. I- thank you."

"You're welcome." Lifting her a little higher until her face is level with his, Theron smiles. "Besides, you're cute when you snore."

"I do _not-_ "

She loses the rest of her retort between the warmth of the water and the heat of his mouth.


	3. sick day

**(Author's Note:** Prompt: a hoarse whisper- "kiss me". Nine/Theron.)

 **Sick Day**

"I'm sorry, Theron," Nine says, swiveling in her chair toward him, "but I really can't hear you, you know."

He makes a face, then holds up the teacup and mouths the word _awful_.

She sighs. "It's supposed to be good for you, according to Lana. I never promised it would taste good."

"Cruel woman," he rasps, setting the cup down on the bedside table and pulling the blankets up to his chin; he's feverish again, probably, can feel a flush rising in his cheeks but somehow he's still freezing. "I'm already sick, and now you're letting Lana poison me."

She's probably going to say it serves him right. It _does_ serve him right, really, pushing too hard, too much work and not enough sleep but still, he can't remember the last time he felt this awful that wasn't from being shot or blown up or thrown headfirst into something. _Coronet City was under quarantine for a reason,_ she'll say. It's only a cold, but-

He sneezes.

Setting her datapad aside, her expression softening, she picks up a stack of clean handkerchiefs- he's gone through an alarming number of them today already, an ever-growing wadded heap littering the floor beside the bed- and climbs the steps to the sleeping area. "I can get you some soup, if you'd rather?"

"No, thanks." It comes out a croak- so much for all the calls he's got to make. "Not hungry."

"You-" she sits down beside him, drops the handkerchiefs in his lap and twines her arms around his neck; stripped down to her shirtsleeves, her bare skin's warm and he leans in, like if he presses in enough he could draw enough heat off her body to finally stop shivering- "have to eat something. You know what they say- feed a fever, starve a-"

"'s a dumb saying.'" He closes his eyes. "Doesn't work if it's a cold _and_ a fever."

She smiles, he thinks; he can feel it against the back of his neck. "Fair point. Now go to sleep, you grump."

"I will," he says, a hoarse whisper. "Kiss me first, though?"

She does, her mouth brushing sweet and gentle against dry lips, a second one against his forehead-

-and then she crinkles her nose, turns her head just in time to snatch up one of the handkerchiefs and sneezes.

Uh-oh.


	4. value me

**(Author's Note:** Prompt- "value me"- one character telling the other how they feel about them. Nine/Theron.)

 **Value Me**

Nine practices when he's sleeping.

It's been easier for Theron, or at least it seems to be. They used to laugh at themselves, at how bad they both were at being sentimental, one of the many things they had in common; words were too difficult, so they together let their bodies say the things that caught behind their lips.

But then he said it first, there on the platform above the forest path, and ever since then the words roll off his tongue like water (and if his _I love you'_ s are water, she's Tatooine- he could say it a hundred thousand times and it would never be enough to soak in fully). She is learning their meanings. With the smallest shift in tone the same three words become _be careful_ or _I miss you_ or _come to bed-_

But most of the time Theron simply means _I love you_ , and his face when he says it is the most beautiful thing she's ever seen.

She replies in kind, every time, because it's true. Force knows it took her long enough to admit it to herself, but it's true, and after five years and everything else he deserves to hear it.

He deserves to hear other things, too, but those are harder.

So she practices while he's sleeping, whispering _I love you_ and _I need you_ and _if anything happens to you I don't know what I'll do_ into the quiet between his even breaths, muffled against the nape of his neck or the curve of his arm. She practices, night after night, different words each time, until she doesn't stutter over them, until she can say what she means to, if only when he doesn't hear.

Tomorrow, she thinks, she'll say them when he's awake.

Tonight, though, he's asleep, curled neat and noiseless with his head on her chest, and she brushes a kiss across his forehead. "Good night, darling," she murmurs, half-gone into dreams herself. "I love you."

-and, eyes still closed, his mouth curls into a smile she can feel against her bare skin. "I know."


	5. it looks good on you

**(Author's Note:** Prompt: finding the other wearing their clothes. Nine/Theron.)

 **It Looks Good on You**

I.

The holo's ringing.

Nine opens her eyes, extracting herself carefully from beneath Theron's arm; he's sprawled out with his face half-smushed against the pillow and his arm draped over her belly, and as she squirms free he mutters something incoherent.

"Shh," she murmurs. "Go back to sleep."

"'kay." He shifts onto his side and after a moment he's asleep again, his breathing regular.

Stars, what time is it? They're halfway to Belsavis on the _'shrike_ and with nothing to do beyond travel and the occasional meeting their sleep schedule's completely off-kilter; the clock on the holo reads 0830, which is as likely to be correct as not, and the display says it's Lana calling-

She probably ought to put on clothes. A shirt, at minimum.

(Lana's more or less used to her general disregard for clothing, at this point- after sharing a tent on Yavin and her having tended to her injuries after Asylum, especially, she's pretty sure she could answer the holo stark naked and merit no more than a raised eyebrow.

The last time she called, though, she'd had Koth with her. That'd be rather awkward.)

Her clothes are- hm. She looks around as the holo keeps ringing, trying to backtrack through possible trajectories. Her underwear is… somewhere, and her shirt ended up-

-dangling off the pilot's chair on the bridge, probably, which does her not a single bit of good at the moment. Theron's shirt's on the floor at the foot of the bed, though, and she slips it over her head and tugs it down until it just skims the top of her thighs. Looking down, the neck's a bit stretched- this T-shirt must be a dozen years old at least, a souvenir of a concert by a band she's never heard of; she's not convinced, between this and his jacket, that he ever gets rid of clothing- and there's a hole in one of the sleeves. Mostly decent, in any case. Good enough.

Still, she sits down at her desk to answer the call.

 _"I won't keep you,"_ Lana says drolly, glance flickering between her sleep-mussed hair and the Theron-shaped blanket lump on the bed behind her. _"I just wanted to let you know I've sent the schematics over, but we can review them whenever you're both awake."_

"I'll- excuse me-" she yawns- "I'll take a look at them shortly. What's your schedule today?"

 _"Only the usual. Call when you're ready, though I might suggest trousers if we're patching the Belsavis ground team in."_

Possibly she was not sitting quite as close to the desk as she thought. "Duly noted."

When the holo clicks off she turns to the terminal beside it and spends a few minutes glancing through the transmitted files- mostly diagrams, as advertised. These can wait until later. Standing, she yawns once more, stretching her arms overhead with her hands interlaced; her knuckles crack satisfyingly, almost drowning out a very faint whistle coming from behind her as she looks back over her shoulder in amusement.

"Sorry, I didn't quite catch that."

Theron, still sleepy-eyed but propping himself up on the pillow, grins as she stretches again- a little further this time, letting the shirt ride up and arching her back for good measure- and this time she can hear his whistle properly. "There- better? Come back to bed."

"Rather. See something you like?" Laughing, she makes her way back across the little cabin to the bed, fingers on the hem ready to lift the shirt over her head. She's only got it halfway off when he leans forward, though, wraps both hands around her wrists and pushes her hands down.

"Normally I'd say it'd look even better on the floor, but-" arms around her waist, now, he pulls her in, her feet lifting off the ground as he slips out from beneath the bedclothes- "I think I like it more on you. We don't have to get up yet, do we?"

"No," she says, settling astride- _oh-_ "we've got plenty of time."

* * *

II.

"How," he says, "does this thing even stay _on?"_

She peers behind her in the mirror where she's touching up her makeup. Theron's standing in the middle of the room, the top of the dancing costume she'd just changed out of dangling around his neck. "Magic. Stars, I'm way too old for this shit."

"Seriously. Between this and the bottom bit, I don't get how things don't just-" he gestures. "Except they don't, obviously. I think I would have noticed."

Blotting her lipstick, she turns. "Honestly, it's half fit and half double-sided tape."

"Tape? Ow."

She's still got a strip stuck on her right breast, actually, and peels it off. "Beauty is pain. Especially in those shoes."

"They can't be that bad." As she pulls the next costume off the rack, mentally cursing Sia'hla all the while- how _did_ she let her talk her into this, again?- he grins and stoops, pulling off one boot. "I bet you I can walk in them."

"They're far too small for you." She pulls the bodysuit up and slips her arms into the straps, even as he gets his other boot off and wedges his toes into one of the shoes. "And I need them in a moment. Give them here."

He manages a few steps, surprisingly skillfully, before he stumbles and braces himself against the dressing-table. "I take it back. These are torture devices."

"Your ass looks great, though."

"It kind of does, doesn't it?" Looking into the mirror, he considers.

She grins. "Mm-hm. Now-" she says, accompanying the words with a swift flick of her fingers as he yelps- "give me back my shoes."

* * *

III.

"How's Hoth?"

"Cold," Theron says as his image flickers, "and snowy. The usual, more or less. I will admit the parka's helping."

He's still got the hood up, snowflakes melting off his eyelashes, despite the roar of the little space heater beside him- their safehouse on Hoth was rudimentary at best but at least it was cozy; she grins. "I told you so. It's been cold here, too. We had to burn your jacket for warmth."

Eyes narrowed, he makes a face at her. "Not funny."

"It misses you, by the way. I took it out for some bonding time earlier- it was looking terribly lonely."

Theron snorts. "Here I sit, frostbitten, duly be-parka'ed, and you mock me. Keep that up and the pirates may end up hanging onto all those fuel cells."

"I'm not mocking you, I'm _teasing_ you. I even took pictures." With a wink, she taps on her datapad, sending the images she'd queued up earlier (after double-checking that the channel's secure). "Here. You can see for yourself."

As they load he flips through them, one by one. "If you've got this much free time, you can do my reports- yeah, my jacket definitely had a better day than I did. Cup of proper caf-" the first image, carefully staged, one sleeve threaded through a mug handle; honestly, she'd just been missing him when she woke up today and his cup on the tabletop and his jacket hanging in the closet gave her an idea- "leisurely walk around the base-" the second, Lana and Koth in the background, bowed over in laughter- "some quality time with you-"

"It's very comfortable, actually. I do see why you like it so much."

"It looks good on you- hang on a- _hello."_ He raises an eyebrow as he reaches the last image, grinning broadly. "I may need to have a word or two with it when I get back."

"As I said," she purrs, "very comfortable. Lovely on bare skin."

Theron shakes his head, still grinning- and saves the image, she notices. "Breach of protocol. If that happens again, I'll have to confiscate it off you."

"I'd expect no less. It's getting awfully forward in your absence, though. By the time you come home, you may have to pry it off me." The image flickers again; the signal off Hoth was always touchy, particularly when it was storming. "I miss you, you know."

"I know. I miss you, too."

"Be careful, okay?"

He smiles as she presses two fingers to her lips and then to the holo's camera. "Always."


	6. hold on to yourself

( **author's note:** this is not in the timeline of Equivalent Exchange. Instead, it's the answer to a question I found myself musing over- if Zakuul had never invaded, what would happened to Theron and Nine? It's not a happy answer. Warning: major character death.)

 **hold on to yourself** **('cause this is gonna hurt like hell)**

There were a thousand ways it could have gone, in the end.

 _She turns her head, a split second too late, when she sees the glint off the scope out of the corner of her eye and the shot takes her clear through the temple and she falls-_

 _He should have known better; this was her territory and she knows it like the back of her hand and the tunnels beneath the city are full of horrors. There is no way out, not-_

That is not how it happens.

They've been hunting each other for years now, she and Theron, as the war dragged on. There are so few of them left now on both sides, Sith Intelligence and the SIS both worn thin by attrition, and they know each other too well to make it easy; they ran circles around each other until one day he sends her a message.

She knows, before she opens it, what it will say.

To: IX  
 _From: TShan .gov  
_ Subject: Drinks?

 _I'll be on Corellia for a few days next week- a work assignment I can't get out of. I've heard the new bar at the Star of Coronet's worth a stop. Drinks on me?_

 _-T_

(She knew this day was coming. She just didn't think it would be quite so soon.)

 _To: TShan .gov_  
 _From: IX  
Subject: Re: Drinks? _

_Let's make it dinner- the restaurant's better than the bar. Seven o'clock on the fifteenth?_

 _-IX_

To: IX  
 _From: TShan .gov  
_ Subject: Re: Re: Drinks?

 _See you then._

 _-T_

It could just as easily have been a day before, or a day after, but the fifteenth was midweek and business would be slow. Less potential for collateral damage that way. She spends the next few days getting her affairs in order- her finances, her networks, all the contingency plans to be set into action should she not survive. ( _Should_ : she may as well not kid herself. There's only one way this can end, and she's so tired of the war that she is ready for it.

It will be good to see him again, one last time.)

* * *

She is ten minutes early coming down from her room and Theron's already seated at a table at the back corner of the restaurant.

He smiles when he sees her, glancing down at her dress- she bought it yesterday, a simple black sheath; it seemed appropriate, given the occasion- and back up to her face, red lipstick and her hair done up with jeweled pins. He's in black, too, a sleek leather jacket still stiff and new-smelling, a buttoned-up shirt and neatly-pressed trousers.

"I thought I should wear something different," he shrugs, "considering the circumstances. You always said the old one was too flashy."

"It is." She sits down carefully when he pulls out her chair. It won't be here- that's not his style. They may as well enjoy dinner. "Though I will admit I was rather fond of it. Hello, Theron."

"Hi, Nine. It's been a long time."

* * *

By dessert they've both drunk too much. In their defense, the champagne was excellent.

She charges it all to her account; he protests for a minute, then lets her. It won't matter in a few hours, in any case.

"I've got a room," she says, "if you'd like to come up."

* * *

There's no way out of this. Orders are orders and his are clear ( _Kill or capture by any means necessary_ \- he shows her the mission briefing. She will never go alive. He knows that.) But-

His hands only shake a little when he undoes the fastenings of her dress.

It's been almost three years since Yavin and his kiss makes it feel like yesterday and it makes her think, just for a moment- what if they just run? There must be somewhere they could hide, some backwater planet where they'd never be found-

They'd be bored out of their minds after a month, if the Council or the Republic didn't find them first. There are things worse than dying.

There's no way out of this.

She pulls him down onto the bed.

* * *

Later, after, he gets up, gets dressed. She'd left a bottle of Whyren's on the bar, two glasses ready beside it, and she wraps a dressing-gown around her while he opens the seal- he checks it first, of course. She expected him to.

She waits for him to take a sip before she drinks, too, as he sits back down beside her.

"So." He drinks, again- she expected him to do that, too; he always drank too fast when he was thinking. "How do you want to do this?"

She smiles, slow and sad, and raises her glass to tap against his, and she watches his face change and she knows that he knows.

"The glasses."

"Yes."

"How'd you know which one I'd take?"

It won't be long. Colorless, tasteless, swift-acting and best of all, painless- he deserves that. He would have done the same, she thinks. "I didn't."

"I- Nine-"

"You should have enough time to make it back to your room, if you prefer. I've no one left who'll care, but if they find you here with me, Theron-"

He sets the glass down, cups her face in his hands, kisses her hard and she can taste the blood on his tongue or maybe it's hers, she can't quite be sure anymore. "No. No- come here."

Even now it's a little hard to move- was she too generous with the dose? She curls onto her side and he half-falls beside her, arm around her waist; she lifts his hand to her mouth, presses her lips to the back of his hand as she feels his breath, slowing, soft now on the back of her neck, and-

It won't be long.


	7. soon

**(Author's Note:** Prompt: What letter would the OC write their LI if the LI was the one who became the Outlander after Marr's ship is destroyed?)

 **To: Theron Shan**  
 **From: IX**  
 **Subject: Soon**

I don't know when you'll read this.

It's been four years since we lost the _Terminus._ The war with Zakuul lasted barely a year and then we were all back at each other's throats again, just like after Revan. Some things never change. But this time I couldn't- I almost quit.

One more day, Theron. I would have been there in a day. We were en route to the conclave when it happened and by the time we got there there was nothing left, just ship parts floating in the void and Arcann's message broadcasting on every frequency. If I'd been there, too, maybe- maybe we could have-

You know I'm not any good at this. You'll forgive me that, I hope.

I couldn't let it go and Lana knew it- she always says she doesn't read people deliberately but she's a terrible liar. It was her idea to send me to Zakuul. You'd probably hate it here- the upper city nobility's horribly stuffy, the parties are dull and the underlevels are like Nar Shaddaa but with less neon and more insane apocalypse cults. But I felt useful for the first time in a long while, and the deeper I dug the more I realized there was something off at the heart of the story.

You're the talk of the town, you know- the wicked Outlander who killed the Emperor. I almost didn't believe it at first but it sounds so ridiculous it has to be true. You _shot_ the Emperor and he _died._ Throwing a blaster at Karrid was one thing, but-

You never were one for taking the easy way, were you? 

I know where you are, now: three levels above me and six blocks over in Arcann's monstrosity of a palace, locked in a vault behind unsliceable doors, frozen in carbonite. It took a year to learn that much. It may take another year to get you free. Lana says hello; she's here with me, too. I thought she'd tell me I'd gone crazy when I told her I was convinced you were still alive. I certainly didn't expect her to go rogue along with me.

But here we are again, trying to rescue you.

I don't know how so much time passes in carbonite. I don't know if you're awake or asleep, if you're dreaming- I'd say I hope you're dreaming of me but that seems presumptuous after all these years, even if we both admit that _no strings_ might have been the worst lie we ever told ourselves. But I stormed a fortress once for you, Theron, and I'll do it again no matter how long it takes.

Just a little longer, I promise. I'll be there soon.


	8. sun

( **Author's Note:** prompt: a 'we're actually kind of being silly for once' kiss)

On reflection, the umbrella may have been a bridge too far.

It isn't really an umbrella, technically- a length of torn-up parachute due for recycling tied to a few piece of scrap rebar- but it keeps the sun off her face. That's the important thing. But oh, the Odessen sun feels good after the chill rain of Dromund Kaas.

Nine rolls over onto her stomach, folding her shirt up and the waistband of her shorts down to expose as much skin as possible and still maintain a modicum of decency. The thin blanket she's laying on only barely cushions her from the riveted panels beneath her, but-

Someone's coming up the ladder; she lifts her head.

"I thought I heard something up here," Theron says, just coming into view as he clears the edge of the tower's roof. "D'you need help with-"

He stops, eyeing her, the blanket and makeshift sunshade, and she waves cheerfully before folding her arms beneath her head.

"What are you doing up here?"

"Sunbathing. Obviously." She squints up at him. "And you're standing in my light."

He crouches down beside her. "On top of the control tower? I'm almost afraid to ask."

"According to Doctor Oggurobb, my vitamin D levels are worryingly low. He suggested a course of supplements, but I'm sick to death of the infirmary so I thought I'd work on it the low-tech way." She presses a bottle of UV protectant into his hand. "And yes, you can help. You can spray my back."

"At your service," Theron grins. "You _are_ the Commander. Though I hesitate to mention that this probably runs counter to your stated purpose."

"Likely. You remember Tatooine, though." (She forgot to respray, just once, their last op on Tatooine. She peeled for a week after that.)

He shakes the bottle, settling down cross-legged in the shadow cast by the chute-silk. "Say no more."

The spray's cold but his hands are warm as the sunlight when he runs them along her skin, up and down her back and shoulders and arms and legs; she closes her eyes, content, and when he's done he presses a kiss to the nape of her neck.

"I'll leave you to your tan," Theron murmurs into her ear before she reaches out to catch him by the sleeve.

"Stay awhile, won't you? I need a pillow." With her grip on him as leverage, she shifts onto her back, resting her head in his lap with a wink. "And you've still got to do my front."

"You are-" he leans down, smirking, when she beckons, and his mouth tastes like the sunblock smells, something tropical that reminds her of Rishi on the days when the breeze blew in from the sea- "an absolute slavedriver. But i suppose I could be persuaded."

She grins and-

A shout from far below, down at the base of the tower- "Commander? Are you out here?"

When they both peer over the edge of the tower Lana's standing on the platform, looking up in obvious confusion.

"What in the Void," she says, "are you two doing up there?"

"Sunbathing," they reply in unison, and dissolve into fits of helpless laughter as Lana shakes her head and sighs.


	9. noli me tangere

( **Author's Note:** prompt: a kiss because i have literally being watching you all night and I can't take any more.

This... didn't really go where it was supposed to.)

The moment the doors shut behind her Nine's already unfastening the clasp of the heavy robe from around her throat. It's been weighing on her for hours, thick black velvet lined in fur and edged with golden embroidery, and when she tries to shrug it from her shoulders it clings to her like a living thing.

She doesn't want this. She doesn't want any of this.

She doesn't want to be their Empress, but it became eminently clear when she claimed the throne that after centuries under Valkorion's rule the people of Zakuul had no idea how to govern themselves and worse, had precious little interest in doing so. They'll grow used to the idea- they've got to, she cannot and will not do this forever- but for now she sits on the Eternal Throne.

And with the Eternal Throne came the coronation, all the trappings of power, the robes and the crown and a heavy jeweled collar across her chest, and right now she wants them all off her body so badly she could scream.

The ceremony's over now, at least, though the ball is just beginning; the crown has to stay, she knows that. But she can rest now, if only for a few minutes, and this robe-

Oh, stars, why won't it come free? She shouldn't have sent the servants away- the collar needs to come off first, she thinks, and it's pinned onto her gown. Head buried in her hands as she sits down on the low stool before the dressing-table, she almost doesn't hear the soft slide of a door opening beneath her frustrated muttering. The footsteps behind her are less than subtle, though, the sharp tap of formal shoes on the marble flooring; bending forward, she reaches beneath her hems for the blade strapped to her thigh.

"You look-" Theron says as she straightens, catching a glimpse of him still tuxedo-clad in the mirror; oh, she loves to see him all dressed up, sleek and elegant- "like you could use some help."

She resists the urge to throw the knife at him. "Stars, don't sneak up on me like that. You know my nerves are shot."

"I wasn't sneaking." He takes another step forward for emphasis, and she can see a gap in the paneled wall behind him. "Unless using a secret passageway counts as sneaking, which it probably does, but the guards wouldn't let me past at the main door, so-"

She chuckles. "No one told _me_ about any secret passages. So much for security."

"You're safe. Senya's watching the other entrance. She's the one who showed it to me when I couldn't find you." Theron pushes the panel closed before he crosses the room toward her. "It runs between here and the south wing- those were her rooms, she said, before-"

(They'd been happy once, too, hadn't they- Senya and Valkorion? Lovers sneaking into each others' beds, late at night and behind closed doors.

A parallel too close for comfort.)

"She would know,.wouldn't she?" Setting her blade down on the tabletop, she gestures toward the collar and the robe. "I do need help. I can't reach the damned pins."

"I'll get them," he nods, pushing the robe back off her shoulders, already reaching for the fastenings. "I was right about one thing tonight, though."

She smiles as the left side comes free, a weight off her chest both literal and metaphorical. "Hm?"

"You _do_ look great sitting on that throne." Theron pulls the pins free on the right and the jeweled collar falls into her waiting hands. "I've been waiting to tell you that for hours. The most perfect empress I've ever seen."

With it gone she can slip free of the robe and oh, that's so much better, the heat of the fur gone from the back of her neck, and she sighs in relief. "Flatterer. How many empresses have you seen, hm?"

"Four. And five queens, and my point still stands. You look-" he goes to stroke her hair out of familiarity and stops, the gold-and-diamond crown and the pinned-up curls of hair beneath like a sign flashing warning- _do not touch._ Instead, he adjusts the drape of her neckline before leaning down to kiss her- "so unbelievably beautiful, and I've been waiting to do that all night, too."

She winds her arms around his neck, not letting him pull away, and he sinks down to his knees in front of her.

"I hate this," she whispers. "I don't want to go back out there, Theron."

"I know." He kisses her again, sweet and gentle. "You don't have to, if-"

"Yes, I do. You know I don't have a choice." She makes a face, her nose scrunching against his, and sighs. "I'm not sure I ever did. I'll save you a dance, though, I promise."

He stops, then, looking up at her as she lets him go, standing, smoothing out the skirt of the black silk gown; when she reaches down to help him to his feet he catches both of her hands in one of his but doesn't rise.

"Theron," she says after a moment, "what are you doing?"

He takes a deep breath, still on his knees in front of her, and reaches into his pocket. "Giving you a choice."


	10. hello, stranger

( **Prompt** : kisses because I missed you and you shouldn't stay away so long)

When he walks into the cantina Nine's sitting at the bar, nursing her second glass of whiskey, and when he slips behind her barstool to wrap his arms around her waist she looks back over her shoulder with one eyebrow raised.

"Hello, stranger," she drawls. "Do I know you?"

"Very funny."

"You look awfully familiar. Like this SIS agent I met years ago on a joint op." As she says it she relaxes into him; his huff of mock indignation tickles the back of her neck. "He hasn't called me in almost three weeks, though, so I assume he must have been eaten by a sarlacc or-"

Theron mutters under his breath. "You know I was on comm blackout, or I would have-"

She keeps talking over him as Lana, beside her, starts to snicker into her wineglass. "-or drove his speeder off a cliff or something equally dramatic-"

"That happened _one time._ And that was not my fault."

"-but really, the resemblance is remarkable," she finishes, swiveling in her chair until she's half-facing him in the circle of his arms, perfectly straightfaced over the rim of her glass as she takes a sip and sets it down. "I was quite fond of him, you know, and at the moment I'm feeling rather lonely. So I suppose you'll do."

Theron blinks for a moment- he's tired, she can tell, both from the long op and from travel lag, his circadian rhythms entirely out of sorts- before he catches on and sighs melodramatically at her. "I made it back two days early and everything. I thought it'd be a nice surprise."

"Do I like surprises?" She taps one finger against the tip of his nose.

"You-" he scrunches up his face at her touch- "do not. But-"

"I missed you." She leans in until his mouth brushes hers; Theron tastes of caf and adrenal stims and hasn't shaved in a week, at least, the scruff on his chin rough against her face. "Comm silence notwithstanding, don't stay away so long next time."

"Is that an order?"

She nods, pretending sternness, sitting up straighter. "Definitely. Five day maximum, I think, effective retroactively. Exceptions to be negotiated on an individual basis."

"And I was gone thirteen- definitely in trouble, then. Tell me there's not a form," he mock-grumbles, grinning. "I hate forms."

"For you?" One more kiss, lingering, before she slips off the seat to stand up beside him. He steals a sip from her discarded glass and then catches her by one wrist, starting to draw her away from the bar; she lets herself be led toward the door. "I might be persuaded to skip the paperwork."

"I _can_ be pretty persuasive."


	11. routine maintenance

(Prompt: Theron, Nine and implant maintenance)

* * *

The third time Theron nearly twitches out of _Nightshrike_ 's pilot seat she turns toward him with a frown.

"I know you keep saying you're fine," Nine says, "but I'm not sure I believe you."

"You remember that shock trap we ran through on the way out of the base?"

She interlaces her still-tingling fingers in front of her, flexing them until her knuckles crack. "It was rather memorable, yes. Why?"

"My implant's shorting out." He twitches again, raises his hand to his temple as he bites back a curse. "Pretty sure it's just a blown connection, so I thought I could live with it until we get back to Odessen, but-"

"Have you tried turning it off and on again?" The moment the words leave her mouth she thinks better of them, watching him grit his teeth and the corner of his eye dart upward with every pulse of energy through the device. "Sorry. Not funny. You know I'm not much good at implant maintenance, but I can take a look at it if you'd like."

"Yeah. Let me just switch over to autopilot-" his other hand hand moves across the console, locking in their route, before he stands and steps toward the rear of the bridge- "and grab my kit out of my bag, and I'll meet you in medbay?"

She nods agreement and stands, too, a watchful eye on him, but he's moving just as well as he'd been when they'd been running frantic from Arcann's knights twenty minutes ago; he hides his injuries far too well for her liking, pushes himself too hard, always throwing himself in front of her into the line of fire. He worries about her, he says, about Valkorion in her head and Arcann and Vaylin relentless at her heels.

She worries about him, too.

By the time Theron steps into the infirmary she's got a pair of sterile gloves, a disinfectant swab and a pack of clean bandages on the tray beside the examination table- she'd be kidding herself to call this proper technique, but she can at least pretend. He holds the little metal box toward, her, hand outstretched.

"You, me and the medbay… must be a day ending in -y." She takes the kit, setting it alongside the rest of her equipment. "Is anything else hurting? I should take a look while we're in here."

"I could do with a thorough going-over- _ow-_ " the flirtation in his voice makes her grin, remembering previous interludes, but when he winces she just points and he settles back onto the table, turning onto his right side, facing her. "I'm okay, otherwise. I'll walk you through the repair."

Hands duly gloved and a surgical mask covering her nose and mouth, she runs the swab across his temple as one of the implant's lights flickers and stutters in time with his spasming muscle and then she opens the case, drawing out the first of the instruments. "Go ahead."

He's done this before, she can tell- with his clear instructions within a minute she's found the fault and starts teasing the wire out around the thin metal rod held in her left hand. Focused on the work, bent over him with her head bowed scant inches from his, she doesn't notice his hands moving until his fingers slide into the back pockets of her trousers.

"Normally I wouldn't complain," she says as the wire finally comes free and she reaches down for the- oh, what's it called? the one with the hook- "but I'm trying to concentrate."

"And I'm trying not to get in your way. I need somewhere to put my hands." Theron closes his eyes. "This is the part I hate, where it feels like it's pulling right on- eh, never mind. You wouldn't know. You haven't got hardware."

"I do, actually. It's basically inactive, now-" (more or less; she still hears him in her head sometimes, whatever it is that Watcher X is now, artificial or ghost or a fragment of her own shattered self. But he is a counterpressure to Valkorion's constant psychic assaults, and there are days when she is glad of him. She never thought she'd say that.) "-and I had to have the scar removed. Protocol. But-" _there_ it goes. Stupid wire. She picks up a fresh one with the forceps, wrapping it into the implant's connection. "It's still there. Too risky to take out, they said."

He blinks at her, slow, as his hands shift and she tries not to squirm. "Didn't know that. Where?"

"My spine."

"The SIS offered me something like that once- okay, if the wire's on, just thread it down into the open port and-" a stifled little noise: the other end of the wire slides into the socket, slipping in and down like a living thing, winding serpentine until it pulls the implant down flush against his skin- "fucking Void, that gets me every _time._ Anyway. I told 'em no. This one's worth the hassle with everything it can do, but you've seen what happens when it malfunctions. I don't care about quicker reflexes if the minute it blows it'd cripple me."

"My feelings exactly. Imperial Intelligence considered augmentations optional, thankfully, and my training scores were good enough without that they never pressured me." Slotting the tools back into their places in the kit box and peeling off the gloves- she doesn't need them now, the last of the real work done- she holds the calibrator between two fingers. "Just the reset now, hm?"

Theron nods. "In a second- I need a break. I was just going to say that I know you don't like permanents. How'd you end up with a spinal?"

"I didn't really have a choice at the time," she says, carding her fingers through his hair until some of the tension eases from his neck and shoulders. A small comfort (he never wanted sedatives if he could help it, not after Ziost) but still, he smiles up at her. "I needed to get somewhere and it was the only way to bypass the security system. It worked, though in retrospect I probably would have opted for the anesthesia."

"You let someone put in a permanent spinal augment with no anesthesia. Seriously?"

She shrugs, smile wry, at the memory. "In a prison cell in Shadow Town, to boot. Not the smartest thing I've ever done. Long story short, I know how you feel, at least in a general sense."

He opens his mouth, then closes it again and just looks at her, eyebrows raised, unspeaking, until she rolls her eyes at him and ruffles his hair.

"Oh, don't you start. Like you never did anything stupid in your younger days."

"Not like that." He's still holding on to her and he slips one hand free, a playful swat against her backside that makes her jump, laughing. "You can start the calibration. I'm ready."

She lays the device atop his implant, lining up the sensors, and activates it. "So you wouldn't call stripping half-naked and throwing your blaster at a Darth stupid?"

"It was a tactical decision, which you promised never to bring up again. And that makes it sound like those two actions were directly related."

"Weren't they?

"In my defense, it was-" the lines across his forehead ease as his implant chirps and its lights pulse once, twice, and then stay on- "really, really hot in there. Which had nothing to do with my blaster misfiring."

She grins, kisses his cheek lightly before straightening, tucking the last of his tools neatly away into their case "Mm-hm. All done. Is that better?"

"Much."

"Should we head back to the bridge now, then, or-"

Theron lets go of her, sitting up on the exam table with his legs dangling over the side. In the next moment he hooks around the back of her thigh with one foot, pulls her forward toward him and the surgical mask down off her face; it falls, forgotten, to the floor. "Later."


	12. out of mind

(Prompt: Person A returns from a mission. Why is there a trail of wet muddy footprints heading into their galactic stronghold?)

 **Out of Mind**

Nine vaults off the speeder almost before it's stopped moving.

The rain was in her face the whole way from the spaceport to her apartment, the wind plastering strands of hair across her eyes; she slicks it back with one hand as she crosses the landing platform toward the door. Another day on Dromund Kaas. Pulling off one glove, she starts to raise her hand to the bioscanner and-

The scanner's powered down, the door standing ajar with a line of sodden, mud-spattered footprints marring the white marble tiles of the foyer.

Eyes narrowed, she reaches back, drawing her knife. She wasn't expecting company tonight, particularly not of the caliber to track mud and- stars, is that blood, there on the doorframe? So much for her plans for a quiet night and a warm bath.

She pushes the door the rest of the way open. The entryway's dark; as her vision adjusts, she scans from wall to wall. No movement, no noise but her own footsteps, bootheels clicking softly on the floor. Nothing out of place so far as she can tell. She takes another step, then a second, further into the room.

The mirror above the console table shatters as she moves past it and she startles, jumping away from the shards of glass that fall to the floor as she watches, the remnants still in the frame looking for all the world like someone drove a fist into the center. There's no one there, she's sure of it; she lashes out at the air with her knife, even so, before the peal of mocking laughter from the next room begins.

"Nice place you've got here, Cipher." She knows that voice, but- "Pity."

No. No. Impossible.

Another crash from the next room, metal on metal this time, and the wet slap of bare feet on the floor moving quickly away-

She gives chase. As she runs through the next room she can see her housekeeping droid in pieces on the decorative carpet, the fireplace poker protruding from its sparking chest. "If you're here for me," she says into the darkness, following the trail of footsteps across the floor, "come and get me. But I know that isn't you, Hunter. You're dead."

"Am I?" More laughter from the kitchen, and a crystal decanter whipping past her head to smash against the wall. "Are you sure?"

 _Is she sure?_ She takes a deep breath, willing the bile rising in her throat back down. "You can't control me. I made sure of that."

The kitchen's empty when she crosses the threshold, a dark stain on the counter radiating outward from a tipped-over bottle of wine.

"But you still did it to me, didn't you?" A different voice, now. "You knew how much it would hurt and you still said it. You made me _kneel_ -"

She freezes, then. A black shape darts across the windows, the outline of a slight figure, hooded- and more wet footprints in front of her even as she watches. "I killed you too, Vaylin. You didn't give me a choice."

"You could have let me win." It's- it's in her ear, she'd swear it, and she strikes out again but her blade hits nothing but empty air. "You took everything: my mother, my brother, my ships. And you didn't even want them. You just didn't want to let me win."

"You didn't give me a _choice_ ," she says again, louder. The balcony door opens, the draperies billowing inward toward her as the wind catches them and a jagged bolt of lightning splits the sky.

"Of course I did." Yet another voice and this time she can see him, outlined on the far side of the balcony with the storm at his back, his arms folded across his chest and the white silk of his robes like a cloud around his body. "I gave you a great many choices. But you refused them all, little Cipher, and look what happened."

When Valkorion gestures she can feel it in her gut, and when she presses her hand against her shirt it comes away wet with blood, just for a moment, before she steps out into the rain and it washes away in slick red rivulets. She can hear all of them, now, voices echoing in her head.

It's so loud and oh, it hurts and she can hear Hunter laughing, Vaylin's howls of rage and above it all, his laughter, mocking her pain-

She drops to her knees, vision blurring, her knife slipping out of her fingers.

Two more footprints in front of her, a figure solidifying.

"Nine? Nine, look at me."

"Theron?" She looks up, trying to focus. Why is he- he shouldn't be here, not on Dromund Kaas- it isn't safe-

She opens her mouth to tell him that.

She feels the barrel of the pistol press against her forehead at the same time she hears the shot and-

 _She sits bolt upright on the cot, the ghost of a scream dying on her lips as she tries to orient herself. Clutching at the metal frame, heart racing, she presses herself small against the wall of the cabin as someone steps into the room._

 _"I thought I heard you awake. We're an hour from Copero," Lana says, then stops, frowning, when she sees her. "Are you all right? You look as though you've seen a ghost."_


	13. a is for akk dog

(Same prompt as the previous piece, featuring a special guest. If you've read my short piece _B_ _loodlines_ , you've met her before.)

 **A is for Akk Dog**

Nine takes the steps up to the house two at a time.

After three weeks away she's glad to be home. It's an odd feeling, still, calling it home: their little house on the hill on Odessen, finally somewhere that's only theirs, hers and Theron's, even if they can see the structures of the base across the valley. Three weeks seems an eternity now; it was long enough in the first years when they were insufferable, probably, not wanting to be away from each other for more than a day (except for those months they don't talk about any more- the longest months of her life, even more than the five years she spent in carbonite).

But Ysa's learned three new words, Theron says, since she's been gone, and he wouldn't tell her what they were. _I think she wants to tell you herself_ , he'd said, _when you come home_. Her clever girl seems to get bigger every time she turns around.

Her rucksack, stuffed full of presents, bounces against her back as she reaches the last flight, and-

A trail of muddy footprints mar the steps, big as her head with splayed claws that left shallow scratches on the stone. Some animal, she supposes, though it's odd that it got through the perimeter defense, and she could have sworn he'd said it rained last night; she would have thought the rain would have washed the mud away.

When she gets to the landing, the footprints continue through the open front door into the courtyard. It's quiet.

Too quiet. There's not much in the way of dangerous wildlife on Odessen with Valkorion gone- she hasn't seen one of the shadow creatures in years- but if they were sleeping or caught off-guard, even a single animal could-

They're probably fine.

"Theron?" She calls out, voice raised. "Theron, I'm home."

He doesn't answer and she tries not to panic. Maybe they've just gone out for a walk? She reaches under the rucksack, readying her rifle, just in case, and crosses the threshold, following the trail of footprints.

There's an akk dog in the courtyard.

Theron's nowhere to be seen when she scans quickly across the yard, although the kitchen door's open and the smell of breakfast wafting on the air toward her (eggs, she thinks, and toasted bread). The dog, a juvenile to judge by size but large enough to be a problem nonetheless, doesn't seem to be paying attention to the food; pawing at the ground and whining, its tail wriggling from side to side, it's focused on something in front of it, which is good. Akk dogs have thick hides and sharp teeth, but if she can flank it before it catches her scent she might be able to catch it by surprise.

She unholsters her rifle, taking aim as she draws level with its side until she can finally see what it's looking at and-

 _Ysa!_

Her daughter's sitting on a blanket barely a meter from the thing's snout, looking up at it wide-eyed and curious, holding out one chubby hand toward it with a happy smile.

Oh, stars, no. She'll never down the creature with a single shot, and the moment it's wounded it's bound to strike at whatever's closest. It'll- oh, its claws are practically as big as Ysa. She's got to-

She maps it out in her head as she sets the rifle down. If she darts in quickly, scoops her up and tosses her in toward the kitchen, it might still hurt her but she could get her out of range of the akk dog long enough for her to kill it and where the Void is Theron?

Twenty steps. Twenty steps away. She starts to run.

She's ten steps away when it closes the distance between itself and Ysa, opening its mouth; she stops breathing as its tongue extends.

It licks Ysa's face.

Her daughter giggles, clapping her hands gleefully as the akk dog sniffs her, licks her face again and then makes an odd little _whuff_ noise, folding its limbs beneath itself to settle onto the ground. She's running toward them, crying out, and finally Ysa sees her and pushes herself to her feet, using the dog's head as leverage, one hand nearly on one of its eyes but it just whuffs placidly again.

"Mama!" Ysa says, unsteady on her little legs (she's only been walking two months, for stars' sake), reaching out toward her from between the akk dog's front paws. "Doggie!"

(They'd been reading a book of animals to her at bedtime- she loved the pictures, not quite realistic, all rendered in bright colors. She can picture the first page now, the letters in Basic and Aurebesh, the drawing in red and purple, its smile wide despite sharp teeth. _A_ , it reads, _is for akk dog_.

That must be one of the new words.)

She hits her knees beside them, folding her into her arms. "Yes, darling. It's a very big doggie, isn't it? But we need to-"

When she tries to lift her Ysa fusses, squirming out of her grip and reaching down for the animal until she's no choice but to let her go.

"Doggie."

The akk dog blinks at her as Ysa drapes herself over its snout and, across the way, Theron steps out of the kitchen with a plate in one hand. Seeing them, he stops, almost dropping the plate, reaching reflexively for a pistol he isn't wearing.

"It's okay," she murmurs. "It seems calm for now. We'll just have to get it outside somehow."

"I was going to ask if you'd brought it with you."

"I was going to ask you the same thing. I was coming up the stairs and saw pawprints." She takes a deep breath as he sits down beside her, setting the plate- eggs and toast pieces, as she'd guessed- on the blanket. "Force, I thought it was going to eat her."

Theron sighs. "Five minutes. I sat her down and went in to make the food- we were going to eat outside and wait for you. Five minutes. I mean, she's been babbling about dogs all week, but I figured she just wanted to play." As they both watch it rolls onto one side; Ysa starts to climb onto its flank and it-

She'd swear it just lifted up one leg to give her a boost, and its tail thumps rhythmically against the damp grass.

"Theron," she says, picking up one of the toast pieces and handing it to Ysa, who takes a bite and then proceeds to feed it to the dog, "akk dogs are Force sensitive, aren't they?"

"Pretty sure they are, yeah. Do you think-"

(Oh, they are in so much trouble.)

"I think we've got a new pet."


	14. say the word

(Prompt request: The way you said "I love you" 27 - A taunt, with one eyebrow raised and a grin bubbling at your lips.

The moral of this story is 'if you don't specify a pairing, you may get something you didn't ask for.' This particular horrorshow borrows a conceit, with some modification, from AO3's salacious_crumpet.

Content warning: (non-explicit) nonconsensual sex. I have used he/him pronouns here to refer to Hunter due to this prompt's place in the story timeline.)

* * *

 **Say the Word**

 _Port Nowhere. 11 ATC._

Nine tugs the hem of the skirt down lower as she settles into the half-circle of the booth; it keeps riding up too high, the cheap leatheris sticking to the upholstered seat, and the larger of their two contacts, a scarred, heavily augmented Zabrak seated beside her, leers at her and slides his hand further up her exposed thigh.

(Normally she wouldn't have cared. She's worn far less in worse cantinas than this but it all fit her properly, her own clothing tailored to the particulars of her body for ease of movement, with holsters and pockets built in for her weapons. But tonight, Hunter had shoved a duffel bag at her when she stepped out of the 'fresher.

"Get dressed. The meeting's in an hour."

She frowned as the chill air from the vents brushed over her skin. "Are you joking? I heard him as clearly as you did. One-on-one, you and him. The moment he figures out that you've brought backup the deal will be off, and Hoth will be impossible without that thermite."

"I've done my research." Hunter took her by the shoulders, turning her, pushing her toward her cot. "He never works alone- one bodyguard, at minimum."

She sat down, clutching the bag, and unfastened the zipper, reaching inside to pull out a handful of silk that's meant to pass for a top, a short skirt, a pair of flimsy spike-heeled boots half a size too small. "You must be kidding. I'm not wearing this. Give me my armor." The clothes pushed back into the bag, she shoved it back into Hunter's hands.

"You won't be there to fight, Legate. What I need-" the duffel launched back at her, hitting her in the chest- "is a distraction. Now," Hunter sighed, "onomatophobia. Get dressed, and pay attention.")

The _Backfire'_ s quiet in the middle of the week, the private room they're in the only one that's occupied so far as she can tell. She sips idly at her drink, some frothy pink concoction, as Hunter and their Nautolan contact slide a datapad back and forth across the table. The drink's lousy, par for the course for an SIS front, and they're definitely getting ripped off; she could have negotiated a better deal in her sleep but the second command after get dressed was keep your mouth shut until I tell you to talk and it isn't her money, in any case, so if the SIS wants to pay double the black market rate for a few crates of explosives they can do it and to the Void with them.

Oh, she'd kill for a whiskey- and a knife, to teach this fucking handsy bodyguard some Force-damned manners. Hunter'd made her leave all her kit, though (not that she'd need a weapon, really, if it came down to it), so instead she grits her teeth and keeps the same prettily vacant expression on her face as his fingers reach her hem.

"Shall we adjourn to my office?" The Nautolan stands, catching up the datapad with elegant fingers, pointed teeth bared in a smile that doesn't reach his eyes. "I would like to use my own data network, given the circumstances, and with apologies to your lovely companion-" he glances toward her and she looks down quickly, focused on the rim of her glass- "I prefer privacy for this sort of negotiation."

"Of course." Hunter answers too quickly, drapes one arm around her shoulders as she suppresses a flinch, a fingertip tracing an idle path along her collarbone. He- what's he doing? When Hunter touched her it was always meant to taunt or to wound, not like this, not- "I don't exactly keep her around for her business acumen, after all. She can keep your friend here entertained while you and I draw up the contract."

She stiffens. This wasn't what they'd discussed back at the safehouse; Hunter had said-

Hunter had said-

She can't remember. She can't _remember_ , her mind a blank, the time simply gone.

"Quite a generous offer. Rather above his usual class of companion, assuming the lady agrees." Head-tresses shift, curling delicately around his neck, the Nautolan turns to consider her again. "We can discuss compensation for her time separately."

"Oh, that won't be necessary. She's a terribly good sport," Hunter says. "Does absolutely anything I ask of her. All I have to do-" a brief pause as her fingers dig sharply into his thigh but she can't find purchase on the armored plate; Hunter only smiles, eyes glimmering- "is say the word."

She turns, starting to tell Hunter to get up, to let her out of her seat, out of the room, trying to raise her hand to slap him. She may be a Cipher and stars know she's gone to bed with plenty of people she'd never have touched, otherwise, when the mission required it, but she's not a collared whore to be passed 'round and she will _not_ -

"Of course." The words spill out unbidden, her body locked into her seat. "Anything. Anything at all."

"That's my girl." One eyebrow raised, a grin bubbling at the corners of his lips, Hunter leans in toward her, tone taunting, mouth to her ear, whispering. " _Onomatophobia. Activate protocol Xesh. Say it."_

She doesn't know what she's supposed to say. They're so far off script from what they'd rehearsed in the speeder on the way over that-

Her mouth opens, and her brain realizes what's coming before her lips shape the sounds and she takes a long sip of her drink instead, trying to drown it in her throat- no, no, no, no-

"I love you," she says. What she means is somewhere between _fuck you_ and _do not make me do this_ and _I am going to kill you, you son of a bitch_ but it comes out sugar-sweet as he lets her go. "We'll be here when you've finished."

"Now, remember what we discussed, and I won't be long." Hunter rises, gesturing toward the door as he looks to their still-standing contact. "Please. Lead the way."

The door slides shut behind them when they leave the room and she can barely hear the outside panel chime, the lock click into place-

"You heard 'em," the Zabrak says after a moment, turning, forcing her back down against the bench, one hand on her neck as the other finally pushes up beneath her skirt; she tries to squirm away, to bring her fingers up to claw at his throat, at his eyes, but her body won't cooperate. "No time to waste."

All she can do is close her eyes.


	15. moral support

(Prompt request: the way you said "I love you"- 27B. A taunt, with one eyebrow raised and a grin bubbling at your lips)

* * *

 **Moral Support**

"Five more," Theron says, looking down at her from his perch atop the right-hand post as she dangles, arms straight, from the bar. "Almost done."

"I- ugh- I'm tired." She pulls herself up until her chin clears the bar. "Thirty-six. Good enough."

He shakes his head. "Nope. You made me promise to make you do the whole set. Forty. Four more."

(She _had_ made him promise; she was nearly back to full strength after the battering she'd taken in the fight with Arcann, but only nearly. Valkorion's meddling had saved her from losing her arm entirely, perhaps the only useful thing he'd ever done in all his interference, but even with the shield the shockwave from the blows had left deep bruises that purpled her arm from wrist to shoulder.

The fighting hasn't eased any, despite Arcann's absence- he's nowhere to be found and frankly if he wants to stay exiled forever, kept safe by Senya, he's welcome to as long as he leaves the war alone. But if Arcann was relentless, his sister's ten times worse-

She's going to need her knife arm. Soon.)

"Slavedriver." Huffing, she lowers herself again, shifting her grip. "Horrible."

"You wound me. It was a command-" he reaches out, tapping the top of her head as she clears the bar once more- "and you're the Commander, right? I'm just doing as I'm told. Three more."

She stops, then, and moves herself over a few handwidths to the right, nearly at the edge closest to him. "So help me, Theron, if you make that pun I will bite you."

"I'm just saying. No puns."

Eyes locked on his, she straightens her arms, ignoring the nagging cramp in her right bicep- nothing worth doing was ever painless, after all. "Bad enough-" she exhales at the nadir point, then draws in another breath- "coming from Lana."

"Well," Theron shrugs, "I mean, you're not commandeering anything at the moment, so- ow!"

Teeth sunk into his thigh as she completes the repetition, she grins around a mouthful of trouser. "I did warn you."

"Next on Odessen News Network: cannibalism on the rise." Rubbing his leg, he leans over to swat at her nearer hand as she scoots herself back along the apparatus to the opposite side. "Commander viciously bites best spy in the Alliance. A new rakghoul plague, or something more sinister? More to come."

She laughs, nearly whacking her chin on the bar on the way down; her arms really are starting to hurt, now. Only two more. She can do this. "You're ridiculous."

"And you love it." Eyebrow raised, he looks down at her. "Luckily for me."

"I love _you_ ," she says as he grins teasingly, a smile bubbling on his lips in the way it always does when she's said something that makes him really, honestly happy, "terrible sense of humor and all." As she starts to lift herself again she winces, though, another cramp rocketing up her forearm until she nearly has to let go. "Though I could stand for a little encouragement at the moment."

"That-" Theron shifts on the support post, leaning over with both hands on the bar- his right between hers, his left on the outside, facing her; he swings himself down ever so carefully until he's hanging just beside her- "I can do. Last two together?"

She nods, takes a deep breath in, and hauls herself up. He's been resting for the last few minutes, watching her, and he matches the movement easily (she tries not to let herself be distracted by the way his muscles shift beneath his shirtsleeves; he's been training harder in the last few months and it shows), turns his head to look at her.

"One more." He nudges her leg with his. "You've got this."

"What do I get," she says, "for the last one?"

In response he dips down, brushes his mouth across her knuckles. "Meet me back up here and we'll figure it out."


	16. in sickness and in health

(Prompt request- the way you said "I love you: 2- With a hoarse voice, under the blankets)

* * *

 **in sickness and in health**

When he wakes, curled awkwardly in the chair beside the bed with his legs half-asleep and a ferocious crick in his neck, Nine's sitting up and reaching out in his direction.

(Her sight's almost back to normal, Lokin and Oggurobb had said, after the last round of treatments and another night spent in the kolto tank; the first time she opened her eyes, still in their makeshift medical facility on Iokath, she'd lifted one hand to her face, fingertips brushing her eyelashes. _Take this mask off,_ she'd rasped as he and Lana looked at each other with dawning horror, _I can't see-)_

He's up before she can try to rise, stumbling as blood flow returns to his tingling feet- he ought to know better, he's not a kid any more and he can't sleep like he used to, curled up in the gaps between shipping crates or tucked up against the warmth of an exhaust vent- and meets her outstretched hands with both of his. "I'm here," he says, "I'm here. What do you need?"

"Need the 'fresher," she mumbles, "again. 'm sorry." She doesn't have her voice back yet either, words chosen carefully to spare her still-swollen vocal cords; she'd screamed and screamed when the throne overloaded on her- when he watched the footage from the room's only camera afterward there was no sound to play back, only the video feed, but stars, it must have been so _loud-_

He was glad of the recording's silence.

He must have watched it a hundred times, magnifying every angle to try to catch a glimpse of the console in the far corner of the room, of the still-anonymous conspirator who'd set up the trap. Until Nine's comm went dead there was a part of him that hadn't believed that the threat was real- there'd been so many other warning letters, so many other nebulous plots against the Alliance that didn't bear out under investigation, that he'd thought this one no different; he'd filed the fragments of the intercept away, half-forgotten in the disaster that was their arrival on Iokath, hadn't told her, hadn't told Lana, even, to have her double-check.

She'd only worn the extra shielding because of what happened to Jace. If she hadn't, if the disperser hadn't borne the brunt of the current-

It would have killed her. It would have _killed_ her and it would have been his fault.

Nine's arms, bandage-wrapped to protect her healing skin, wind carefully around his neck as he bends over to gather her up, pressing a kiss to her upturned forehead. "Don't be sorry. You know that's why I'm here- in sickness and in health, right?" He tries to keep his tone light as she nods, curling into his chest, her body a tight little knot of pain despite all the drugs. "You're sure you don't want the bedside one, though?"

"No. 'm not an invalid. Just-" she scowls. She was never any good at asking for help, even now, and he knows how much her weakness infuriates her- "need to stand up."

By the time she's at the edge of the bed she's sweating, her legs trembling as her bare feet brush the floor. He counts to three and she tenses, ready, hanging on tight around his neck as they stand up together; her breath's a hiss, sharply in and then out, ragged, her nails digging into his skin. But after a moment she's almost steady on her feet and her grip on him eases.

"Only took one try this time," he says by way of encouragement. "You'll be running laps around the base by the time we get back to Odessen."

She snorts, her first step tentative, sliding her grip down to his arm, and eyes him dubiously. "Liar."

"It's barely been three days." They cross the room together, step by step- six paces from bedside to the 'fresher door, a path he's walked a dozen times at least in that time with her in his arms, first, her head lolling on his shoulder, and now side by side. "Lokin told me not to expect you up for at least five, so you're already ahead of the curve."

( _At least_ had been hedging their bets and they all knew it, carefully dancing around the damage the shock had done- her muscles swollen, skin marred by the thin lines forking like lightning up both arms, nerves dull and numb alternating with too finely keyed, every change of her bandages a torture she endured, pale and shaking and teeth clenched, without complaint.

Force, she's so fucking strong. She's so much stronger than he is and she always was, durasteel at her core, and she complained so rarely even when they asked so much of her.

Which was always.

Was it ever going to stop?)

One hand on the doorway, she eases herself carefully over the threshold. "Said no caf-" she coughs, every word an effort, but stays upright- "'til I could hold a cup.'s good motivation."

He smiles. "And here I thought it was all for me."

She makes a face at him as he lets the door mostly shut behind her; he leans against the wall, arms folded across his chest. For the next few minutes he waits, listening for anything beyond the usual sounds of running water or the cycling refresher until the door slides open again and Nine's leaning against the sink, trying to smooth the loose woven tunic back down around her thighs one-handed as she looks at herself in the mirror.

"I look-" she says, giving up on the tunic to rub irritably at her face, at eyelids left puffy by all the fluids forced into her body, at her hair tied up in a messy knot. He'd tried his best but he could never manage it the way she did, and Lana'd only pointed at her own short hair and shrugged, helpless- "like shit. Could've warned me."

He opens his mouth to tease her in reply but the look in her eyes makes him stop.

 _This is your fault._ It echoes in his head again, the same drumbeat over and over for the last three days. _If you hadn't blown it off, if you hadn't let her go alone, this wouldn't have happened._

"No, you don't."

(She doesn't; she could have crawled straight out of a Tarisian bog and she'd still look beautiful, even if on better days she'd argue that he was biased- which, yeah, of course he is, she's his _wife_ -)

"Liar," Nine mutters again, glancing at him to orient herself before she takes a step away from the basin, though there's the smallest gleam of amusement in her eyes; she looks like herself, if only for a moment. "Always say-"

She overbalances, then, legs unsteady, and he lunges forward to catch her before she hits the ground.

"I've got you." He doesn't need to say it- he knows that she knows- but it's more for his own reassurance, probably, as he crouches down beside her. "Do you want to try to walk back, or-?"

An open-ended question, giving her an out. She's been so stubborn today, tired of being confined to bed, and she's wanted to get up every time, to move, to walk on her own- but this time she's still shaking and she casts her gaze down, disgusted, to her own trembling body. "No," she whispers, so quiet he can barely hear. "Help?"

He lifts her, careful, and carries her back to the bed, sets her down among the pillows and gathers up the blankets around her and redoses her painkillers until she's cushioned and comfortable and warm, and when he's finished she looks up at him and finally smiles.

"Theron?"

"Hm?" He strokes her hair with one hand until the lines across her forehead ease.

"I love you." Her voice gives way, cracking on the last word. "I'm sorry about-"

He leans down to kiss her, cutting her off gently and she makes a happy little noise against his mouth and it's a knife right through his heart. "I love you, too. Don't be sorry."

"But-"

"Nothing that happened was your fault," he says, and kisses her again. "None of it. And when I find whoever did this to you, I will do whatever it takes to make sure they can't ever hurt you again."

She nods, half-asleep already; after a minute or so her eyes drift closed and her breathing steadies and he just sits beside her on the bed, not wanting to move.

He needs a plan.

He needs a plan.

 _Step one,_ he thinks. _Find out who sent that message._


	17. (and it felt like a kiss)

(prompt request- the way you said "I love you": 11/26- With a shuddering gasp/Broken, as you clutch the sleeve of my jacket and beg me not to leave

this is not really a spoiler for Copero, because even having read the datamine I'm pretty sure this scene is quite entirely imagined.

but Nine is not the begging type, not usually. the first time Theron leaves, she does not ask him to stay; he finds his way back to her in time. the second time he leaves her is on Umbara. this is the third.)

* * *

 **(and it felt like a kiss)**

 _Go,_ Lana says. _I'll clean up the rest of this mess. Go catch Theron._

Nine runs.

She runs through hallway after hallway, Theron's footsteps echoing just out of sight in front of her, always just around the next corner- but it's him. She doesn't need to see him to know it, not after years spent fighting side by side; they knew each other's patterns, could predict which way the other would turn by the subtle shifts of weight at each other's backs, the lighter strike of one foot compared to the other signalling a turn, a lengthening stride-

(She'd thought she could predict him, at least. She isn't so sure any more.)

But when she makes the last turn he isn't there. His shuttle stands ready on a far platform but the engines are silent, the boarding ramp still stowed away, and between her and the platform there's nothing but empty corridor and tall pillars. He must have come this way. Where is he?

Her mind retraces her steps as she keeps moving forward. If he went left instead of right at the first turning, he might have-

No. Impossible. He's got to leave Copero now, the artifact in hand and his arrangement with the Chiss shattered, and this was the only way to his shuttle. He must be here. Stealthed, perhaps, but he hates generators: they gave him headaches, he said, and he only ever used them when he was with her.

Another step, and another, past the first set of columns, glancing from side to side along the background mosaics for the telltale out-of-focus flicker of someone hiding in plain sight. As she scans the left-hand niche there's something on the floor, a scrap of fabric or a bit of strapping- it might be nothing, just trash, but the right-hand niche's empty and so she stoops to pick it up, to tuck it into her pocket for later analysis. She turns, and-

Theron's on her like a shot, then, darting around the pillar to shove her back against the wall, one hand pressed across her mouth to mute her cry of surprise.

 _This is it_ , she thinks. _This is how I die._

(She always knew he'd be the death of her, one way or another.)

She can't tell what he's got in his other hand, not with his forearm low across her hips- one of his pistols, most likely, or a little knife, it'd have to be something small at so close a distance. He starts to raise it higher, up toward her throat. Her lower body's free; she could get away now. She ought to move. She has to move, but- _Void damn you, Theron, if you're going to do this then do it quickly-_

His right hand is empty when it comes up along the side of her cheek.

"Don't move," he whispers, the cold anger in his eyes that shocked her so on Umbara fading like a mask dropping away, and takes his other hand from her mouth to catch her face between his palms. "This is the only place the cameras can't see."

She blinks up at him, silent, heartbeat thudding so hard he can probably feel it vibrating through her bones into his cupped fingers- she was right, she was _right_ even though Lana'd thought she'd lost her mind when she shoved the datapad into Lana's hand ( _the Scions are our allies,_ she'd said. _It's a ploy. He's trying to throw you off his trail-_ but it wasn't the same at all, not a Scion at all but another mask, one that reminded her of a picture he'd taken as they explored the palace on Zakuul in the first days after her reluctant coronation.

 _Like something out of a nightmare._ They'd looked up at the statue, its fangs sharp and inlaid stone eyes glimmering. _And I thought the old Jedi stories were bad._

She knew, then. She knew he was trying to tell her something, but ah, love-)

There are a hundred things she wants to ask him but just like then, standing in her quarters as her datapad fell from her shaking hands, all she can say is the same thing over and over again. "Theron," she says, "Theron, why?"

He presses his forehead to hers. "I can't- there's not enough time, but-" whatever composure he was hanging onto shatters when she reaches up to hold him, her fingers trying to thread through his hair out of familiarity but brushing bare skin instead- "oh, sweetheart, I'm sorry, I'm so _sorry_ -"

It's their first kiss all over again, bright and burning and ripping every bit of air out of her lungs until she has to pull away, shivering, desperate for breath. As she collects herself she studies him; Theron looks exhausted, huge dark circles beneath his eyes, the shorn areas of his scalp a pallid contrast against the tan of his face and neck. She traces one of the lines with a fingertip.

"You cut your hair."

"I know." He makes a face. "The pattern-"

"It's awful."

"I know." He kisses her again, gentler, brushing back a loose strand of her hair to tuck it behind her ear. "You cut yours, too."

"It burned when the train crashed. I didn't have a choice." She could have hit him for that- he knew exactly what happened because he'd _been_ there _,_ let alone saw the holo she'd broadcast across the galaxy, and a not-so-small part of her wants to slap him, to make him hurt like he hurt her- but she doesn't. "You could have told me you wanted to go undercover, if that's what you're doing."

He doesn't reply, the look in his eyes answer enough. She knew it, she knew it-

"You could have told me," she hisses, lip curling. "Force knows I could have kept it secret. We could have worked it out between us instead of you running off on your own-" Theron shakes his head, starts to say something in response, and she holds her hand up to his mouth to silence him. "You broke my _heart_ , damn you. You don't get to make excuses for that."

"And if I make it through this-" when she starts to lowers her hand he catches it in his, presses it to his lips until she can almost read the movements of his mouth against her palm- "I will spend the rest of my life making it up to you. But you have no idea how deep this thing goes, Nine. No idea. I can't even-" He reaches up to his temple and pushes with two fingers until his implant starts to lift free, and as he winces he pulls a little datachip free from where it lay in the socket beneath; tucking it into the hidden pocket in her collar, he straightens his shoulders for a moment and starts to take a step back. "It's all I can give you. I need to go."

"No!" She clutches at the sleeve of his jacket- a new one, still stiff despite the deliberate scuffing and aging, not the soft red leather she's so used to- pulling him back in close. "No, Theron. Please. You've done enough. We can finish this together."

He shakes his head again. "Soon. But not yet. I've almost got them to-"

A noise, far down the corridor; someone's coming.

"Please," she says again as she hangs onto him, voice breaking on the words; he pushes her back to the wall one last time, kisses her hard enough to bruise until he pulls back with a shuddering gasp. "I love you. Don't go."

"I love you, too." Theron forces her fingers open to break her grip, takes her by the wrist. "But I don't have a choice right now, and I need you to do something for me."

She nods.

"They'll have seen me catch you here," he says, "on the cameras. I'll tell them we fought. But you were always better at close quarters than I was." As he says it he curls her hand shut again, forming a fist, raising it until her knuckles brush his cheek. "I would never have beaten you, not in a thousand years. You always said that, didn't you?"

No.

 _No._

"Four times," Theron closes his eyes for a moment, "should be enough to make it look convincing. Stars know I've got enough bruises other places."

She tries to lower her hand; he pushes it back up, eyes open, and after a moment, the footsteps drawing ever nearer, she swallows and nods.

"I love you," he whispers. "On three."

 _Three._

 _Two._

 _One._

"I love you, too," she says, and draws her fist back.


	18. the ambassador

_(For the "Pinch Point" AU prompt on Tumblr- if one decision in your character's life had been different, how would they have turned out?)_

 **the ambassador**

The reporter settles into the chair on the far side of her mirror-polished desk and pulls out a small recorder. "May I?"

"Feel free." She sits up in her own chair, ankles crossed. Thank the Force it's only audio. On the far side of fifty now with three new grey hairs in the last week alone, she's grown tired of seeing herself on holo.

"We'll begin, then. Thank you again for taking the time to meet with me, Madam Ambassador. If you'd please state your name and title for the record?"

She nods. At least this one's got manners and his vetting came through with no red flags; still, she adjusts the blaster holstered beneath her desk, just in case. "Nyriala Barra, Ambassador of the Sith Empire to Alderaan and Deputy Minister of Imperial Logistics."

"Unusual, isn't it? For a deputy minister to be posted outside the home worlds?"

"A little, perhaps. But after the Zakuul war-" she doubts he even remembers the war; he's only a pup, probably no more than half her age- "we realized the folly of consolidating leadership in too central a location. Between the sacking of Korriban and the fall of Dromund Kaas we lost two-thirds of the Corps in a six-month span. And the weather's much more pleasant here, in any case."

"Of course. Now, to start our agreed-upon questions: what drew you to a career in the Diplomatic Corps in the first place?"

She takes a sip of water, collecting her thoughts. Better the polite answer- there's no use in speaking ill of the dead, after all. "I was assigned to the Imperial Academy for schooling when I was eleven. In those days, the Academy trained both diplomatic and Intelligence cadets, though the curriculum was the same until sixth form."

"Did you get to choose," he says, "which you wanted?"

She shakes her head. "I was short-listed for Intelligence, actually. But one's parents had to consent to the allocation, and mine refused. The risk was too great, they said."

(She fought them for weeks about it, calling home again and again in tears, screaming and crying and begging them- it was such an _honor_ , why couldn't they see it-

but they said no. And that was that.)

"You'd lost your brothers in the war with the Republic, right?"

"Clever boy," she smiles. "You've done your research. Yes- I was the youngest in my family by nearly a decade, and three out of four of my siblings died in battle before I was ten. I suppose they couldn't fathom losing another child. And so-" lacing her fingers together, she rests her hands on the desktop- "here we are. Though with the way the war went, I must say they were right."

The reporter nods, adjusting the position of the recorder. "But you still work with Sith Intelligence fairly often, don't you?"

"I'll have to decline to answer that one. You understand."

(Far more often than she'd thought, especially during the flareup just before the Zakuulans came. She remembers one party in particular, dancing with a man she's ninety-nine percent certain was an SIS agent. He was a better dancer than she'd have given the Republic credit for, even if his Kaasi accent was awful, and they spent half the night talking about vintages of whiskey until the security alarm sounded and in a blink he was gone.

A damn shame, that.)

"Of course, Madam Ambassador. And you've no children of your own?"

"No," she says. "I'm afraid I never quite found the time."


	19. first kiss

_(For OC Kiss Week: day #1- first kiss._

 _We've seen this already, of course. Here's Theron's POV.)_

 **First Kiss**

Bad enough that he can't even carry his own gear, ribs still spiking pain through his body with every breath and his shattered fingers bandaged together, head swimming even with the painkillers almost out of his system. Bad enough that he pretty much just told her half his life story without even meaning to.

But now Cipher Nine's sitting down next to him, side by side on the sagging cot as he packs his last few tools into their kit, and his heart's pounding like he's been running for hours-

Just tired. Tired and hurting and keyed-up after a very long few days.

Nothing to do with her. Definitely not. No way.

She starts to stand up from her place beside him on the cot, lifting his overloaded satchel- he's down a change of clothing after his run-in with Revan but she'd insisted he take most of the extra medical supplies (y _ou need them more than I do_ , she'd said, and the way his head throbbed he couldn't help but agree). "Oof- heavy. What've you got in here, bricks?"

"Only a dozen or so," Theron says. He knows her tone well enough now to know she's teasing him, one of her favorite recently-acquired hobbies, and she only grumbles a little when the buckle comes unfastened and drags her back down to sit. "And all your extra ration bars. I might need a snack later, after the kolto tank and the lecture."

He can only hope the kolto tank comes first. Emotionless as Jedi were supposed to be, he could feel the disappointment radiating off Satele in waves when she'd walked into the safehouse, and he'd bet good credits that he's got a conference call with Marcus in his future- and fuck, if Satele pulls Jace into it-

Her laugh brings him back to himself.

"You can keep them. I've got crates of them back on my ship. So the food wasn't all bad, then- any other bright spots?"

Her attention's focused on the slipped strap dangling off her shoulder- it's always been finicky and the buckle goes crooked on her when she tries to thread it back through; the tip of her tongue peeks out as she tries again and then a third time, her irritation more obvious, her teeth sinking into one side of her lower lip.

Is he staring? He's probably staring.

He knows the trick to his old satchel by heart and reaches across to help her, looping the buckle back through, still watching her face, the way the scar running crossways across her cheek pulls a little when she smiles as he slips the refastened strap up onto her shoulder, the corners of her eyes-

He's definitely staring. Shit, shit, _shit, what's wrong with you, Shan, pull it together-_

Oh, fuck it.

"I can think of one," he says, which might be the actual worst pickup line in the history of the galaxy.

(Then again, he's guessing he's got about even odds of this working versus those being the last five words he ever says to anyone before Cipher Nine, Ghost of the Empire, knifes him to death for trying to make a move on her.

He is almost sure it would be worth it.)

She glances up when his hand goes still, resting on her shoulder. Her eyes meet his and for a second she doesn't move; he thinks she's going to- he's not sure what, dodge him or push him away or say something, anything- but then her expression softens, pupils huge and dark in the harsh fluorescent light overhead.

This is the worst idea he's ever had.

He leans in and kisses her-

-and oh, Force, she kisses him back.


	20. that'll leave a mark

_(Prompt request: 99. "I don't care what they said, it doesn't mean shit!" - Nine/Theron._

 _Theron POV.)_

 **that'll leave a mark**

Twenty-two hours of radio silence. Twenty-one hours since anyone's heard from Nine.

No news is good news when it comes to reports from the strike team, but she should have been back hours ago. At first he figures she just came back to base without telling him. Force knows he wouldn't expect her to- she always came and went as she pleased, her private time carefully guarded except when she chose to share it with him, let alone now when they're barely speaking outside their scheduled meetings. But she hasn't even commed Lana and no one's seen her since she wandered out into the woods.

Something's wrong. Something's definitely wrong.

He paces circles around the holotable, one way and then the other and then around again, until he almost trips over Lana's chair, half a meter back from where it was during his last lap-

"Theron."

He stops. Lana looks up at him, arms folded, and shakes her head gently.

"Go get some sleep. You look awful, and you're wearing a groove in the floor."

"We should be looking for her," he says in reply. "She should be back by now. If she's hurt- if he hurt her-"

"She'll be back any moment, I'm sure." Her face is less certain than her voice. "She knows the timeline for the raid. But if we still haven't had word by dawn, we'll have the scouts start looking."

He frowns. "Something's wrong, Lana. I know it."

He'd thought saying it out loud might make him feel better, that hearing it would make him realize how ridiculous he was being. But the knot in his chest just tightens all the more and he rubs his eyes and sighs until she reaches out to rest her hand along his forearm.

He waits for the press of her mind on his, trying to slip beneath some unguarded edge to pry at the thoughts beneath- he'd heard Nine scream at her all the way down the hallway, even as he was walking away himself, and he's not sure even now that Lana understood any of it.

(He understands why she did it now.

But it might be too late for that.)

The intrusion never comes, though. "If you're not going to sleep," Lana says instead, "we could use some more caf. Can you bring some up from the mess?"

Theron nods. "Yeah. Sure."

He walks out of the War Room and across the complex, takes the turbolift down to the mess level and he's almost to the mess hall door when he hears something that makes him stop and turn around.

"-I'm telling you, I heard it from one of the strike team and he heard 'em all arguing the other week before the raid. But it's not like anyone should be surprised. Commander used to be a Cipher. They do half their work on their backs." The taller of the two soldiers snorts, leaning back against the corridor wall. "Too bad that Arcann's half-machine. He had a few more human bits left, we could just strip her down and throw her at him and the war'd be over in about five minutes. Like we used to do with Lorant, right?"

He takes a deep breath in, staring flatly at the soldier- one of their newer recruits, a massive ex-Imperial Major named Pierce; Nine never liked him and had said as much but they needed combat squad leaders badly- until the man looks over to him with a raised eyebrow.

"You got a problem?"

"If you keep running off your mouth like that-" Theron takes a few steps closer to the duo. Fuck, this guy's a head taller than him and easily twice his weight, what's he _doing_ \- "I might. Do you always talk about your superiors like that?"

"Only when I hear a story this good." Pierce cracks his knuckles loudly before turning back to his companion. "Anyway, they said we only got the staging point because-"

Something in him snaps, then. "I don't care what they said, it doesn't mean shit. That's enough."

"Wait. Shan, right? You were there, so let's hear it. Alderaan. Did she, or did she not-"

He never does find out what exactly the question was going to be, though he's pretty sure he knows. Hard to keep asking questions with a fist in your teeth- his first punch shuts Pierce up pretty quickly.

(He was wrong on one front, though.

This guy's more like three times his weight and he hits like a wampa. This is going to leave a mark.)


	21. i thought you'd never ask

_(Prompt request: 91. "Can I hold your hand?")_

 **I thought you'd never ask**

Her birth certificate- wherever it is now, purged from the Imperial database long ago with the rest of her records- may have said Dromund Kaas, but Nar Shaddaa feels like home.

The thoroughfare around them hums with life, with shouts and whispers and the roar of speeder engines, the soft whoosh of hovercars passing overhead and the low thump of bass from the cantinas on either side of the street, and Nine takes a deep breath in and smiles. Turning to Theron, she-

Where did he go?

When she looks back over her shoulder he's a dozen paces back, scanning the menu posted outside a café. Whatever he sees, it doesn't appeal; with a shake of his head, he starts back in her direction.

"Nothing you like?" She doubts he can hear, but he reads the shape of her mouth and shrugs as he draws even with her..

"Menu's okay," he says, "but I'm pretty sure someone just got stabbed in there to judge by the noise and the blood trail, so-"

Dodging out of the way of a chirruping astromech, she nods. "The next block over's quieter. Fewer bars, fewer murders, better food. Come on."

The alley on their right goes straight through to the street she means and it's mostly safe by Hutt space standards- not one she ever would have picked to use as a dead drop or a meeting place, too wide and too well-lit for bad behavior. Ducking around the corner, she reaches back for Theron, to pull him along with a tug on his sleeve; instead, her hand finds his and her fingers slip through the spaces between his, unthinking, a comfortable reflex born of enough nights spent in bed, now, curled around each other in waking and in sleep, that she's grown used to it.

This isn't her quarters, though, or the cabin of a shuttle. This isn't hiding. This is standing in the middle of a Nar Shaddaa alleyway, in full sight of the street, hand in hand.

(She never cared before him. But she's not sure it ever mattered before him.)

She freezes.

In the next second an armor-clad Nikto almost barrels her over and she has to let go to keep from pulling Theron down with her.

"Out of the way, lovebirds. Some of us got places to be."

Before she can answer the Nikto's halfway down the alley and she doesn't bother replying, just straightens up and brushes invisible dust from her clothing to cover her awkwardness.

"I-" she starts to say- "it's this way. I didn't mean to-"

"He came out of nowhere. It's okay."

She wrinkles her nose. "I meant that I ought to have asked you before I did that. We're out here in the open, and I just-"

"Are you asking me," Theron grins, looking down at her hands now pressed against her waist- better there, or they'll do something unwise of their own accord, probably- "if it's okay to hold my hand?"

It really does sound stupid when he says it like that, but- "Possibly. Yes."

"Possibly? Or yes?" His smile broadens; she's never quite sure, when he looks at her like that, whether she wants to punch him or push him up against a wall or both in variable order. Mostly both, she thinks.

"Yes."

"So-"

She sighs, reaches out toward him again. "Can I hold your hand? While we walk?"

"I thought you'd never ask," he says, and laces his fingers through hers.


	22. new recruit

( _Prompt request: 84. "I can't believe you talked me into this."_

 _Featuring teenage sassmaster Theron Shan.)_

 **new recruit**

"I can't believe you talked me into this." He glances down at his caf cup for a minute- this stuff is fucking _terrible_ , even by his usual low-budget standards- before he returns his attention to the detention room window. "You told me you had someone for me. He's just a kid."

"Seventeen, he says. No papers to back it up, of course-" Jannah slides a datapad across the desk toward him- "not like they ever do. But this one's good, Dev. Got past the physical perimeter at EvaCorp and sliced through three layers of security with just a basic spike. He had a dozen files halfway cracked when their shock net went off."

As she keeps talking (she was Coruscanti to the bone, a thousand words when ten'd do) he watches the kid through the mirrored glass. Skinny and spiky-haired in a red jacket about a size too big, he picks idly at the locked cuff chaining his wrist to the table- seventeen's probably about right. Much younger than that and they're usually scared; much older and they've usually got a record.

"Given that shock nets are on the banned list as of last year," she finishes, "they're keen to keep this quiet. I can't just cut him loose, but I thought of you. You keep saying you're short on recruits again, and-"

"We are." Draining the last of the caf, he flicks the cup into the garbage. "He tell you why he did it?"

It's warm in here, and Jannah unzips her uniform jacket as she kicks back in her chair. "That's the other reason I thought of you. Besides the credits, obviously," she grins, "apparently he was bored."

Hm. He can use that, maybe. "You think he'll bite?"

"I don't know. But he seems like a good kid, and if I've got to send him down he's not going to stay that way."

"Yeah." He pushes away from the table as, beyond the glass, the boy glances up toward the door and then back down toward his cuffed hand. "Yeah. Twist my arm. I'll go talk to him."

She smiles. "Thanks, Dev. We still on for dinner tomorrow?"

"Seven o'clock. I'll pick you up." One last read over the datapad and then he turns the doorknob, steps into the interrogation room, and he's four steps in before the kid finally speaks.

"I wondered when they were planning to send in the bad cop." Looking at his features, he could be from anywhere, his accent a hodgepodge- not Imperial, but not straight Core, either. Clear eyes. No track marks, no tattoos. No bad habits to break, hopefully. "I'm guessing that's a no on the sandwich, then."

He chuckles. "You really think I look like SecForce? Yikes."

The kid glances sideways toward the door again but it stays closed; his mouth settles into a narrower line. "You work for them, then? Look," he says, "like I told her before, I was just paid to get the files. I didn't read 'em, so if you're going to-"

"How'd you do it?"

He blinks. "Huh?"

"You cut through corporate-grade encryptions with a ten-credit spike. That takes some talent." Sitting down across the table, datapad between them, he rests his elbows on the table and leans forward toward the kid. "Who taught you to slice?"

"Self-taught, mostly. I picked up stuff here and there." His wrist must be sore- he's still rubbing it as he shifts in his seat, a few burn lines snaking dark red and angry up into the cuff of the jacket. "Y'know. Around."

"On Manaan?"

The kid blinks again. "Never heard of it."

"Your racing league record says otherwise, although I'm pretty sure the minimum legal age is sixteen. You were- what? Fourteen?" He gestures down at the datapad. There wasn't much in the file at all- no birth record, no customs clearances, even facial recognition drawing a big, fat blank. For all that he's sitting in front of him, the kid's practically a ghost. "But it was just a question."

"Almost fifteen, not that they were checking ident cards- the bosses liked their racers lightweight. What're you going to do, arrest me?"

 _Smartass._

He likes this one.

He's got a cuff key in his jacket pocket and digs for it, flips it up and down between his fingers, working his way around to the important questions. "You got any family? Friends? Anyone who can put up bond for you?"

"Not really." Eyes tracking the key, the kid shrugs. "No one with that kind of credits, anyway. This job was supposed to be... never mind. And no. No family."

"Someone must have raised you. You don't strike me as a Temple foundling, and you sure as hell didn't grow up down here. You can read, for one thing."

That gets a response, a split-second flash of anger. " _Raised_ is a word, insofar as I could live up to what they wanted, which I couldn't. If you're trying to get me to go to the Children's Home, forget it. I'll be eighteen in two months and then I'll be out on my ass again, just like-" Free hand curling into a fist, he flinches. That hand's got char marks, too.

Void, he's touchy. "Not what I was going to suggest. The way I see it, you've got two options. Nobody's coming to bail you out, so: you can either tell me to fuck off and take your chances with the Coruscant legal system, or you can listen to what I have to say."

The kid quiets, sinking lower in his chair.

"Very good. Now, what's your real name?"

He makes a face. "You guys know my real name- it's right there on your datapad. Theron Shan."

"Well then, Theron Shan-" leaning forward again, he touches the key to the still-locked cuff- "take this as a show of good faith. My name's Dev Andress. I work for the Strategic Information Service."

A nod, a raised eyebrow as the cuff springs open. "I've seen the recruitment posters on the Holonet- 'now hiring data analysts.' Very suit-and-tie sounding. Not really my thing."

"It's a little more complicated than that. You know what Imperial Intelligence is? What they do?"

"Not personally," Theron says, "thank fuck. One of my friends got picked up by the Imps last year. He came back short three teeth and about half his brain cells. I learned to steer clear real fast."

"The SIS is the Republic's answer. It's data analysis for some of our people, sure, but it's also slicing. Field work. Hands-on. You seem like you've got a talent for it, and we need people."

He opens his mouth and then shuts it again, tilts his head, considering. "Is this a joke? You're kidding, right?

"No joke. The pay's not great and it's dangerous as hell, to be honest, but you won't find a better cause." Might as well be honest. Idealists never last long, not in this line of work.

They sit there, silent, for at least a minute.

And then- "Anyone ever tell you you're a shitty recruiter?"

"I've been told that before, yeah."

"All right," the kid says, and sits up straighter. "I'm listening."


	23. sharks

(Prompt request: 63. "What do you mean? It's exciting!"

Featuring Nine in her Intelligence training days... and a guest we'll meet soon enough.)

sharks

"Why not?"

She frowns, running one finger beneath her collar when she's pretty sure no one else is watching. It's far too warm in here to be comfortable, the air heavy with perfume and candle smoke. "As soon as we're done I'm going back to the dormitories. This place feels wrong."

"What do you mean? It's exciting!" Aylee's staring, wide-eyed and too eager, at the cluster of Sith and hangers-on standing near them in the slowly-emptying ballroom. "And you heard what they said- things are just getting started. Let's go upstairs. Come on."

"We're supposed to be working until midnight." Her back aches from standing but she doesn't dare lean against the doorframe, not with so many cameras around. This assignment's as much a test as any classroom exercise they've been given this year, even if it is a gala. "You know what our instructions were."

Rolling her eyes, Aylee goes back to gawking. (The girl acts like she's never seen a Sith Lord before, but she did come from the Ziost academy- maybe she really hasn't. Not like home, where even when she was a child one couldn't cross the street without some big-headed apprentice threatening to skewer one for getting underfoot.) "You used to be fun. Last weekend I had to drag you off that guy to make it back by curfew."

"It was our night off, so that's not a fair comparison. And you saw him. Can you really blame-" She cuts off the phrase abruptly as a silk-robed woman lingers too long at the doorway between them; meeting the woman's eye, she shakes her head tersely before she catches sight of the hilt tethered to her sash.

Uh-oh. They're meant to be guarding the off-limits area, two to a door like the rest of their class cohort, but if a Darth wants through it's not like her little pistol's going to do a damned thing against a lightsaber blade-

The woman moves on and she sighs in relief, then makes a face. "See? I'm not hanging around a minute longer than ordered, and neither should you."

"And it's-" their chronos chime the hour, in perfect synchrony- "midnight. Party time."

Before she can stop her, Aylee's halfway gone across the room, unfastening her collar and the top buttons of her jacket as she goes. She doesn't bother calling out after her. It isn't worth it; Aylee's clever enough but never could follow instructions, bending all their tasks to suit herself. She'll scrub out by year's end at this rate.

It _is_ midnight, though. Her orders didn't say anything about waiting to be dismissed so it's time to get out of here, not a moment too soon- if the dancing in the center of the space was restrained an hour ago it's devolved into something… well. She heard what happened to that Chiss in the third-year class, how he was so fucking proud to have a Sith patron until they found him wandering outside Darth Valascis' estate half-naked and screaming, and there's no way any of their pretty promises are worth the risk of ending up like _that_.

The exit's at the far end of the ballroom and she walks quickly, heels too loud against the marble floor, as Seb and Daivi break from their post ahead of her and slip through the huge carved doors to the foyer beyond. At least she isn't the only one eager to escape- oh.

"Leaving so soon?" She's yanked back and nearly off her feet by a Sith in species as well as in power, skin red and eyes yellow and talons sharp enough to pierce through her sleeve as his hand wraps tight around her wrist. "Oh, but you mustn't. We're only just getting started."

Another hand on her face, another Sith, breath hot on her cheek, gripping her chin to shift her head into profile. "Look at that complexion, darling," the woman purrs. "Like cream- imagine the contrast. How perfect."

She stiffens. Void, their touch almost burns her- "Please, my lords. I can't-"

"I insist." Beneath the pleasantries there's malice buried in his tone as he starts to pull her back toward the stairs to the balcony level. "Now come along, my dear, and-"

"Cadet Barra." The sound of her surname, somewhere behind her, snaps her back to attention; she turns, breaking free of their touch. "Where do you think you're going? You're expected back at quarters."

She can't quite place him at first glance, though he seems familiar and clearly, he knows her- scar-bordered cybernetics covering one eye and much of his lower jaw, dark hair flecked with grey and wearing the rank bars of an Army major, the man clamps one hand down on her shoulder and, ignoring the snarls of protest from the pair of Sith, steers her to and through the doorway before she can even muster a response.

He doesn't stop moving until they're clear of the estate and, on the pavement outside, finally lets her go. "My apologies if I misread the situation, cadet, but I rather got the impression you weren't going willingly."

"No, sir." The chill outside's a welcome change; she takes a deep breath and then another. "No. I wasn't. Thank you, sir."

"There are people in that room who would have given a great deal to have taken your place," he says. "But not you. Why?"

She arches an eyebrow, folds her arms across her chest. "That's a very personal question, Major-?"

"Ruana. Galen Ruana." That's where she knows him- Lydie's patron and one of the upper level instructors, a liaison from Army Intelligence. She'd only seen him in the corridors once or twice, but she recognizes the name. "And I'm merely curious. You needn't answer- though I did tell the Director this assignment was unwise. A room full of sharks, and he dangles you in front of them like so much bait."

She nods. "I suppose that was part of the exercise, wasn't it? A test of judgment."

"You're likely right." She's definitely right. She can tell by the way he smiles. "But still, your choice would have been to leave?"

"I- sir, permission to speak freely?"

"Granted, Barra."

She shrugs. "I didn't like the way they looked at me, sir. Like sharks, as you said, but part of me thinks it wouldn't be a metaphor. That they might actually just eat me."

"Then you learned that lesson far younger than I did. Good for you." Glancing back over his shoulder, he shakes his head at whatever he sees and when she turns, too, two shadowed figures flicker at the far edge of her vision as a hovercar rounds the corner to pause in front of them. "Though I'd suggest you not walk back alone."

"It's only three blocks, sir. I'd manage."

"No," he says, "you wouldn't. I'll drop you by the dormitory. I insist."

At least this one, she thinks, isn't going to swallow her up. "Yes, sir."


	24. if i didn't know any better

_(Prompt request: 60. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were trying to seduce me."_

 _Content warning: brief, non-graphic discussions of pregnancy and childbirth. Also, bad pick-up lines.)_

 **if I didn't know better**

What a mess she is.

Looking down at herself, pushing away the bedsheet and drawing her robe back together where it's come undone, Nine sighs. Her convalescence after Iokath took ages, weeks and weeks before she could so much as aim a blaster properly- not that she's planning any battles in the near future, not now- and this won't be nearly so long, but still it feels different. Her body feels different, exhausted and sore, belly soft and pouching in the absence of its passenger, breasts heavy.

How many hours has she been sleeping? It hasn't even been a day and already she's attuned to Ysa like an alarm, bells sounding warning in her head at intervals; she looks up at the wall. Two hours.

Any minute, then.

Like clockwork, Ysa stirs in the bassinet placed carefully beside her bed in the medical ward, squirming, arms somehow free of her swaddling and reaching up (she _swore_ she'd done it properly that last time; this child's an escape artist and no mistaking it. That oughn't be a surprise, all things considered).

"All right, my love." She sits up properly, letting the sheet drape around her waist, "I was hoping for a shower first, but I'm guessing it's breakfast time."

The room's quiet. Theron had been here when she fell asleep, she's sure of that; he must have gone to get her things out of quarters. Gathering Ysa up, she settles her into the crook of one arm, lets the robe fall back off her shoulders- how does it go, again, getting the angle right? It really oughtn't to be this complicated, she can run an entire damned Alliance and can't even manage to nurse her own _child_ , for stars' sake-

There.

Ysa blinks up at her after a little while, seemingly content, and she throws the bedsheet over her shoulder to catch any mess as she lifts her up, belly against her chest, patting her back probably more carefully than she needs to but she can't quite stop worrying she's going to break her, this fragile little thing they made. The noise Ysa makes is decidedly indelicate, though, and she laughs as she lowers her back into the cradle of her arms.

"You take after your father, I think."

Ysa wriggles again, waving one little hand toward the door, and when she tracks the gesture with her eyes-

Coincidence. It must be.

(If it isn't, this is going to take a lot of getting used to.)

"Yes," she murmurs, "very good. You found him."

"What did I do?" Theron's standing in the doorway, her biggest duffel bag on one hip stuffed completely full. "I brought some clothes and everything from the 'fresher cabinet, and Senya threw half a dozen other things in here and I have no idea what any of them are for but she insists you'll need them, so-"

She chuckles softly. "I just need something to walk out of here in, you know. I'm not planning on moving in permanently."

"I know," he says, coming in, and sets the bag down on the bed. "But you two are the talk of the base, so I thought you'd want options."

"I've no idea why. It's not as though she's the first child born here."

Theron shrugs. "Yeah, but she's yours. It's- I don't know, it's symbolic. Keeping things going, somehow."

"Ours," she says by way of correction, starting to sort through the contents of the duffel. "I seem to recall you being involved in the process. And I'm fairly sure all this Force nonsense is your fault."

"True, and probably also true." Ysa's fussing now and he reaches down for her, lifting the squirming baby out of her arms; that calms her almost immediately and he smiles and oh, are they in big trouble. "If it's still okay, Satele'll be here in another two days, she says. Doubt she'll have much to add in terms of practical advice, given-"

"Did you tell her?"

He nods. "Yeah."

"And?"

He shifts his grip, lifting Ysa closer against his chest. "If she thinks I'm going to let her take her to Tython-"

She blinks. "Of course not. Did she actually suggest that?"

"No. Not at all."

"I suppose what I meant was whether she seemed surprised- but no, that's out of the question. So is Korriban." She sighs. They never talked this through, not really- the idea came up, but only in the abstract.

"So what _are_ we going to do?"

"I don't know- we'll think of something. But for the present, and since you're here, I'm going to take a shower." Arms loaded with her soaps, clean undergarments, and a few of Senya's additions (a salve and lovely thick gauze pads wrapped in linen that she would have questioned yesterday but oh, today she could kiss her; they still weren't really equipped for obstetrics, not properly, and she's going to ruin all the sheets in the medical unit at this rate), she stands, robe half-stuck to her thighs, and starts toward the refresher.

After two steps she's biting back curses. The painkiller's worn off and she doesn't want more but fucking _stars_ do the damned stitches hurt when she moves; she just needs to keep walking, one step after another, until she can get into the water. That should help.

Settling her things on the counter, she starts the shower going and then peels off her clothing. Behind her, she can hear Theron setting Ysa down, a low murmur of reassurance over the sound of the water and then his footsteps crossing the room as she lets her tangled hair down and steps beneath the stream.

 _Ow ow ow that_ stings _oh ow_

"If I didn't know better," his voice is playful as she bends to pick up a cleaning-cloth from a low shelf, "I'd say you were trying to seduce me."

"Theron," she says through gritted teeth, glancing back over her shoulder to where he's stepping through the 'fresher door, "you are my husband, and I love you. But Void help me, if you try that line again any time soon I will rip your dick off."

His swallow's audible. "Noted. I just- I love you, too, and after yesterday I feel like I should probably tell you you're beautiful about once an hour for the next hundred years, and- can I help? With anything?"

He always knew just what to say to soothe her flaring temper.

After a moment, the water running clearer around her feet, she reaches out toward him. "I know you're dressed, but will you help me with my hair? It's all knots, and-"

"Turn around," Theron smiles and pushes up his sleeves to elbow height. "I've got you."

"You always do," she says. "You always do."


	25. mistakes

_(Prompt request: 52. "I think I'm in love with you and that scares me half to death."_

 _As is almost always the case with me and prompts, this is a horrible, horrible cheat. The first time they say "I love you" to each other, the prompt doesn't fit- so this moment takes place a few days beforehand._

 _Theron POV.)_

 **mistakes**

This was a mistake.

He should have stayed down in the conference room, kept planning the raid on the Gemini frequency. They move tomorrow, if Nine agrees to Havoc's involvement (a whole separate question. He thinks she will, since Jorgan's team's gone rogue just like the rest of them and stars know they could use a second strike team desperately to back up Kaliyo, but he's still actually got to get her okay. He might have just gone ahead with it, once- better ask forgiveness than permission and all that, but now-

Right now he's not that much of a hypocrite.)

He should have kept working. R&R's one thing when there's time to spare; right now, though, he's got a primary plan still in third draft and a backup plan that's still half in his head and to be honest he's never liked this holofilm, anyway-too sappy by half, and it reminded him way too much of his parents to be comfortable viewing. But it'd won the poll they'd put up in the mess hall, and when it came time for the screening Lana'd practically dragged him out of the War Room by the collar.

 _Theron,_ she'd said, _please. What kind of example are we setting if we can't put things aside for a few hours?_

So instead of getting anything else done he's sitting on a folding chair in the cleared-out hangar, the film halfway over, and he's about ready to crawl out of his skin.

Nine's sitting five rows ahead, Lana beside her, chin upturned toward the projection. Even at this distance, even looking at the back of her head, he can tell by her posture she's exhausted. She hadn't been sleeping well for a month, maybe a little longer, and since Alderaan he's not sure she's been sleeping much at all; there are mornings where he can tell the only thing keeping her awake are stims.

He's been there. The tremor's a dead giveaway.

(He should have said something, then.

He should have said something before, too. But they're just stuck, static, both wrong and both right and they know it but they're both too fucking stubborn to be the first to give way- oh, this is so _stupid_ , Nine, why didn't you just- )

The whole room goes silent. Everyone knows this scene, after all, the most famous one in the entire movie: the Jedi Knight and the commando locked in an embrace, forehead against forehead, before the Jedi pulls away and whispers (and the smuggler sitting in the chair beside him whispers, too, her rapt attention on the screen)-

 _"I think I'm in love with you_ ," the Jedi says, as the commando- bad casting, he thinks, given the woman probably couldn't even lift a rifle- reaches toward him again, _"and that scares me half to death."_

When they kiss the crowd erupts in cheers and applause and in the noise of it he almost misses Nine, up and on her feet, turned in profile, her back rigid, her face a mask of anger. Lana's holding onto her wrist, trying to keep her seated, but she yanks her hand free; in another few seconds, even as the cheers continue, she's moving down the aisle toward the door.

Even compared to this morning, the circles beneath her eyes are darker, her skin paler. He recognizes her expression, too, now that he knows what to look for.

 _Valkorion._

Her lips move silently, unreadable in the near-dark as she keeps walking- Force, what's that monster tormenting her with now? He should stop her. She shouldn't be wandering, not alone, not like this.

He gets up. When he reaches out his hand as she goes past it brushes against her clenched fist; she misses a step and just for a moment she snaps into clarity and looks at him and he can read the words on her mouth, then-

"I'm not scared, liar," she whispers, flinching, and he knows she doesn't mean him but he doesn't know what she does mean, either- _not scared of what, Nine?_ \- "I'm not. I just-"

And then Lana's there, too, hand on her arm, guiding her toward the door. "I'll take her, Theron. It'll only-" she sighs. "Go find Doctor Lokin and meet us in her quarters."

Before he can respond they're gone into the hall as the film keeps playing behind them.

 _"What's there to be scared of?"_ the commando finally says in reply as he turns to stare at the screen. _"I know. I've always known. I was just waiting for you to say it."_

 _Oh-_


	26. different

( **author's note:** a moment, post-KOTET. Vaguely NSFW. Theron POV.

Nine's different today.

Victory suits her, true- there's an ease in her that he hasn't seen in months, the tension that's lived behind her eyes for years finally, finally gone. Of the two of them she's always been the fiercer and when she reaches for him, inexorable, the weight of the world falls away under her deft hands and her mouth, hot and wanting, and the graceful curve of her body as they move together; he thinks, every time, _if this was the last minute of my life it would be enough but oh, Force, please, just a minute longer-_

-but he was always the one, at the end of it, to pull her back in close. She indulged him at first, he knows; he'd feel her shifting sometimes, restless, when she thought he was asleep.

(He'd wondered if he'd overreached, those first few times on ships and shuttles when they didn't have to pretend propriety. War being war and circumstances being what they were, they'd fucked half a dozen times before they'd shared a bed on purpose- passing out half-drunk and exhausted on a couch after that first party didn't count; he's pretty sure he fell asleep in the middle of something but she didn't complain when they finally woke up, so he's pretty sure she did, too- and he'd thought maybe it was more than what she'd wanted, that she was going to wake up some morning and tell him to go.

He would have learned to live with that.

But on Odessen she asked him to stay, an extra toothbrush and two caf cups on the table and empty drawers in her closet only for him, and they realized both of them somehow got through thirty-something years of living without knowing how to do any of this-

Someday they'll stop teasing each other about it. Someday.)

Tonight, though, she clings.

Most of her wounds from the last days are mental. Still, he tries to be careful, on his knees before her with his tongue and hands moving slow and deliberate at the apex of her thighs like an act of silent worship- _oh, sweetheart, you've done so much_ , he says, _let me do this,_ and it is quiet but for her moans and the soft slide of fabric as the sheets bunch up, little by little, beneath her clenching fists.

 _Please_ , she whispers, _Theron, please, please_ (she so rarely says it that it's a surprise every time; she commands, his Nine, even like this- _yes, like that- more, harder, there, oh-_

She's spent so long refusing to surrender that there is a strange delight in the rare moments where she yields.)

 _Please_ , she says again, and at first he keeps going, a little quicker to match the tempo of her words, but then she's reaching down for him, the gesture a guidance but her words failing her- _I need-_

He knows.

He knows. It's familiar as breathing, familiar as his hand in hers, when he uncurls to match the sprawl of her body below with his above; she lifts up to meet him and stars, there will never be anything better than this, not if they live a thousand years-

She clings, arms around his neck and ankles locked behind his back, mouth pressed to the side of his neck still moving in words he can read against his skin, and somehow the only words she has tonight are the same he's already heard, again and again and again.

 _Please, Theron-_

And later, as he murmurs to her, running his fingers through her hair in the way that always helped her sleep, she turns to face him and she clings then, too, and burrows against his chest.

 _It's quiet_ , she says. _It's finally quiet._

(It finally is, isn't it? It finally is.)

He pauses. _Do you want me to stop?_

She shakes her head; he can feel her smile. _No._

She's different today. It's good.


	27. facta non verba

**facta, non verba**

By the time Nine stops crying, her sobs quieting into soft whines like a wounded animal and then, finally, into the slow steady breaths of sleep, it's been over an hour and she's added another half-dozen items to the list of Things For Which Theron Is Going To Have To Apologize.

She tries to get up after a few minutes. Her legs are numb, her stomach aching where Nine's head is pressed against it (it was only a stun bolt, just like they'd agreed, but that didn't make it hurt any less and his aim was too good by half. The shot took the breath right out of her). But when she shifts Nine opens her eyes.

"Theron?" Nine reaches out, half-slurring. She's got enough painkillers in her system to stun a bantha. How is she still awake? "Theron, I dreamed-"

Damn him. Damn him to the Void and back.

"It's only me," she says quietly. "He can't- he isn't here. Do you remember what happened?"

"Lana?" Nine turns her head, just enough to look up and see her- the movement sets the bruises off again but she breathes through the pain; she'll see to herself later- and then blinks, slowly, eyes bloodshot and bruise-rimmed. "It's not real, is it? It's not- he didn't-"

"I'm sorry." She doesn't know what else to say.

Nine starts to cry again, then.

They should have known that this would happen. They'd assumed too much, assumed that because she'd endured the worst of the struggles against Arcann and Vaylin, the worst of the Emperor's constant assaults on her mind without complaint that she could get through this. It would be hard, they knew- harder still because it had to be Theron to go.

(No, he says over her protests as they sit, heads together, in her quarters. _It's too far over your head. If this goes even a fraction as deep as I think it does-_

 _I can manage it. It'd make more sense if it was me, wouldn't it?_

Theron shakes his head. _Not any more. Not after Iokath._

He's right, of course. But she keeps pushing until finally he raises a hand, snappish, to silence her.

 _Lana, no. You aren't cut out for this. There's no room for mistakes with people like them- one slip and you're dead, and you're going to have to do whatever it takes. Whatever they want. No second thoughts._

 _I-_

 _No,_ he says again. _It's got to be me. But I'm going to need your help._ )

Nine couldn't be allowed to follow him, not right away. She'd have scented him out like a hunting hound and all their planning would be for nothing- the circle of conspirators would close in around all of them and it would be the end of everything, all their work, all their plans, all Nine's sacrifice and suffering and all the new scars she bore for naught-

But this is monstrous.

They'd assumed she could endure it.

They'd assumed. They were wrong.

So instead she strokes Nine's hair, newly shorn, brittle pieces coming free between her fingers- she'd gone through her quarters and taken everything she could lay her hands on that might have been dangerous (which, knowing Nine as she did, was practically everything including the bedsheets and spare changes of clothing but she had to leave something for her to wear), but she hadn't thought about the medical bay; at least it'd only been her hair Nine had cut- murmuring comfort as best she can. "I'm afraid it's real. But we're going to find him. I promise."

(Three true things in a row. Almost a record, today.)

"Why?" It's barely audible, more wail than word, and with so many tears her nose is running, making a mess of her tunic and tabards as Nine curls and clings, childlike, to her legs. A small price to pay after what they've done to her. "Why?"

"I wish I knew."

(A lie.

So much for new records.)

Theron will have so much to make up for when he comes back. But Force help them all, he's got to live through this first.


	28. de gustibus non est disputandum

(Prompt request: "de gustibus non est disputandum/there's no accounting for taste."

Nine/Theron. After Nathema.  
Not safe for work. Look, I don't know either. I'm just the vector for their nonsense nowadays.)

 **de gustibus non est disputandum**

The door to her quarters- no, _their_ quarters, two in a room alone together for the first time in months and months (two hundred and fifty-four days if one was counting which of course she wasn't; that would be absurd, as though she didn't have anything else to occupy her time)- slides closed, the lock engaging with a soft click, and they're alone.

Theron stops for a moment, looking around the room like he barely recognizes it. It's all the same, though, save new linens on the bed and- oh.

"That's new," he says, staring at the golden chestplate on its armor stand. "It's… nice."

She can't help it; the words slip out like a hundred knives flung from her lips, months of simmering anger seeking an outlet. "An old Zakuulan technique, apparently- Arcann made it for me. A gift."

"Oh." A pause. "So-"

"I told him he should have finished it sooner. It might actually have been useful, then- it would have saved me a few nasty scars. I don't think he expected that." He smiles, then, the first time she's seen him smile since they returned to Odessen; mostly he's just looked tired. "But he insisted I keep it, so there it is."

"Oh," Theron says again, and looks at the couch. "I guess we- should we sit down? We should talk- I promised that I'd tell you-" He's tripping over his own tongue and it's funny, almost- after all the lies he's told to so many people, he barely manage a single sentence with her any more-

But it's only almost funny.

Is this what they are, now? What they've become?

"No." (It won't be. She won't let it be.) "I don't want to sit down."

He looks up, startled, as her stripped-off jacket hits him squarely in the middle of his chest; he sets it down on the couch. "Okay. But can we still talk?"

"I don't want to talk, either."

"I know you're angry, Nine, but please, I-"

She misses the last half of that, undershirt covering her ears as she pulls it over her head, but when she flings it at him she thinks he's starting to catch on. She does not throw her belt, just lets it fall down to the floor- the clasp would probably actually hurt him and Void, she's furious at him but not that kind of furious, wants to vent it not in knife cuts and blaster shots and vicious words but in teeth sinking in and nails raking sharp and her hands clenching tight in his hair (if she doesn't shave it all off first- that haircut ought to be a war crime).

"Shut up," she says, "and come to bed."

That stops him mid-sentence, his mouth half-open. "You don't want me to explain?"

"Explain later." She plants one raised foot on his upper thigh and he starts to unfasten her boot, reaching down toward the clasps, a reflex like breathing. "Fuck now."

Theron blinks.

And then he lifts her up and it's just like it always was- with no time to themselves since the end of it all she hasn't kissed him since Copero and Copero was grief made manifest, bitter on her lips and his kisses hurt, then, almost as much as the strikes of her fist must have hurt him. This, though-

It's like daylight.

(It's just been so long, alone in the darkness, that she'd almost forgotten what it looks like.)

He clears the steps up to the bed in four long strides, even with her legs wrapped around his waist and her mouth stealing the words from his as he speaks them.

"I did promise to make it up to you."

"You did." She falls back onto the bed as he lets her go, a little inelegant, sprawling, but she really doubts he much cares at this point. "Stop talking."

"And I missed your birthday. And Life Day. And our anniver-" When he has to pause mid-sentence to bat her trousers down from where they've landed on his head, he finally, finally quiets and looks at her properly. "You know, I figured you were going to throw something at me, but I kinda thought it'd be something breakable. A lamp, maybe. A bottle or six. Divorce papers."

She rolls her eyes, hooks one bare foot behind his knee until it buckles and he staggers forward. "Theron."

"I don't-" He catches himself on the edge of the bed, kneeling, still not quite giving way; she sighs and props herself up on her elbows. "I need to tell you something."

"No, you don't." That was rule number one from the moment they started having rules: there were always going to be things that were better left in the dark, awful things done out of necessity because that was what they were made for, both of them, why they fit so well together and why sometimes they had to agree to pretend not to know. Sometimes it was better that way. "You don't."

"I do. We promised."

Oh. Well. Rule number two, then.

She'd expected that, frankly. She's got eyes; she saw the way that pretty Chiss boy had looked at him and he could be so persuasive, her husband could, when he wanted to be- "Valss, wasn't it? Copero. You dropped him on me out of a shuttle. Rather rude of you."

His face falls. "You knew?"

"I had a feeling."

Theron starts to back away, starts to stand. "So-"

"So-" she sits up fully, wraps her arms around his neck and kisses him and then lets herself fall, dragging him down alongside her- "you've told me. Done. Over with. Come here."

"I had a whole speech ready, you know," he says a minute later, half-breathless. "I thought you'd be-"

She sinks her teeth into his throat. "Angry? Two hundred and fifty-four days, Theron Shan. Two hundred and fifty-four days alone in this bed. Of course I'm angry-" he gasps, then, her hands giving lie to her words- "but I'm willing to let you work it off."

"Force help me-" he shifts under her guidance, down and down and down the length of her body and yes, that's better, maybe it's stupid of her to let all of this go so easily (he could be so persuasive, her husband could, with his clever, clever tongue) but she missed him so fucking _much_ , yes- "I don't deserve you."

"You know what they say-" she's already panting and she forces herself to breathe, measured and slow; oh, he's going to have to work much harder than that- "there's no accounting for taste."


	29. everything

(Prompt request: a kiss... because the world is saved. Post-Nathema.  
In _Equivalent Exchange_ continuity, meaning one primary difference from canon- Lana knew.)

 **everything**

It takes an hour to cycle the tank.

It would have been faster on her ship but the little shuttle's all they've got, just big enough to carry the three of them home, and its stores only have enough kolto to keep the tank full. It's got to last until Odessen, or-

(She's not going to think about that right now.)

She and Lana agree to simply pretend neither of them is hurt at all- their wounds will keep; without the kolto, Theron's might not. But she could never carry him by herself, even at full strength, let alone with a dozen half-healed saber wounds and her hands still numb and tingling from killing a machine-god- how many gods has she killed, this last year?- and so Lana helps her lift him free of the emptying chamber and, together, teeth gritted against their own pain, they settle him onto the bed.

"You should sleep," Lana says. "I can keep watch until it's time to move him again."

"No. If he wakes up, I need to be here." She shakes her head stubbornly, wraps a blanket around him and then a second and a third- it was cold, she remembers, when she woke to her injuries for the first time after Asylum, there in the medical bay on the _Gravestone_.

(She always imagined she could hear it whispering to her, the voices loudest at its heart. But she'd thought it was one of Valkorion's tricks. Stupid, stupid, _stupid_ -)

"We'll be there soon. He'll be-" The monitor chimes softly over Lana's words and they both look to it. His heartbeat stutters, steadies out, stutters again; Lana reaches for a syringe of painkiller and presses it into her palm. "They'll be waiting when we land. It'll be all right."

"I need to be here," she says again. Theron's forehead creases as the needle pierces his skin, and she strokes his face with her free hand, whispering soft apologies, until the lines of tension fade. "Do we have any stims left?"

"Yes, but you've already used three since we-" Lana sighs, long past argument, hands trembling. Her last attempt at healing took too much out of her- the energy had to come from somewhere, she said, and with nothing else to draw from she pulled it from herself. "Never mind. I'll put a pot of caf on."

She nods. "And could you bring my datapad from my pack? I ought to respond to Satele's last message."

"Did you tell her?"

"She already knew. She-" she frowns, trying to imagine. Had it been the same when Jace- oh, stars- "she felt it, she said."

Lana flinches.

"She wants to help, and if she's been hiding out where I think she has she may beat us to Odessen. I need to send the passcodes, and-"

"I'll see to it." Lana's hand rests on hers, just for a moment, before she pulls away. "It's the least I can do. We knew Theron was taking a massive risk, but if I'd had any idea how dangerous the Order truly was I would never have-"

" _We_ knew?" She's been looking at Theron while they talked but that gets her attention properly; she snaps her head round, staring straight at Lana. "We. You knew."

(-and in that moment it all makes perfect sense, the way they'd looked at her that morning on the way to Umbara, the stun shot, the silence afterward that at the time she'd mistaken for confusion, for shocked disbelief but no, it was _guilt_ -)

"Only at the beginning," Lana says quietly, eyes closed. "We didn't know then how they were watching us, and it was too dangerous to send messages back and forth. Once he was gone, I was as blind as you."

"But you knew. You knew, and you let me believe he thought I was a monster who deserved to die. You let everyone else think I was delusional for believing that my own husband loved me enough to forgive what I've become. You- you _saw_ the way they looked at me, Lana, and you didn't say a word. Why?"

Hands clenched into tight fists, Lana presses one to her mouth. "I promised him. I promised him I wouldn't tell you. I promised him I'd keep you safe, if-"

They both look down at Theron, then, as he shifts and shivers despite the layers of blankets.

"He would have done anything for you." It's a whisper, barely audible over the slow burble of the kolto tank and the beeping monitors. "Anything. Everything. Even if it meant you hated him for it."

There's nowhere to sit in the tiny medical bay and suddenly all her wounds ache terribly. She leans forward against the bed, holding tight to its edge. "And you?"

"And me. If my being beyond forgiveness is the price of the galaxy's survival, I'll pay it gladly."

 _Oh, she's so tired, so tired, oh, Force-_

She closes her eyes. "We've lost the _Gravestone_. We've lost the fleet. I think we've paid enough of a price already, don't you?"

Lana's silent.

"I'd like to be alone with him, please," she says, "for a little while."

There's a gentle pressure against her mind, just for a moment, that feels something like gratitude; when she opens her eyes again the room is empty.

Theron's stirring again on the table but it's far too soon for more painkiller and they're out of blankets and she hates this, this awful helpless feeling. He came back to her. Somehow, she always knew he would. But to lose him now, after everything else they've lost- she won't. She can't. But there's nothing she can do but make him comfortable.

When he couldn't sleep, back in the days before he left her, she used to hold him; he'd rest his head in her lap and she'd trace patterns on his face and through his hair, talking about nothing, singing quiet little songs. (He used to tease her when she'd sing: she knew so few childhood songs, so few lullabies, that she'd simply start with whatever came to mind. _Don't they sing their children to sleep_ , he'd say over some silly pop song, i _n the Empire_?

But he didn't know any more than she did. The Jedi didn't sing their children to sleep, either.)

There's just enough room at the head of the treatment bed for her to climb up. Settling there, cross-legged, she lifts his head carefully off the pillow and shifts herself into place.

"It's okay, Theron." She leans forward, presses a kiss to his fluttering eyelids, one and then the other. "I'm here."

He doesn't respond- it's better that way, probably, remembering how much her own wound hurt. The monitor readout's a little steadier, though. She keeps talking.

"We match now, you know. Lucky for you, I like scars." He's got kolto in the corners of his eyes; she wipes it away carefully. "I'll make sure to nag you every day about patching them, too. Front and back."

That might have been a smile. Was it a smile?

"Us and medical bays, right?" Her voice wavers- she's got to be stronger than this, she's held it together this long and he needs her to-

Theron blinks up at her, slow and sleepy and bleary-eyed from the meds but oh, it's definitely a smile. "That's my girl," he whispers. "Such a romantic."

"Don't try to talk-" she can see it hurts him as he inhales, trying to respond- "just rest. We'll talk properly when you're better."

He wrinkles his forehead and shifts beneath the blankets and after a few false starts he lifts one hand to catch at hers where it's resting against his cheek and presses his fingers flat against her palm. _I'm sorry,_ he spells out, letter by letter. _I'm sorry. I wasn't watching, I thought he was-_

"Don't be sorry. Not for that."

 _Lot of things to be sorry for._ He turns his head to kiss her fingertips. _Everything. I love you._

She lets her fingers curl over his, as close a thing as they can manage right now to an embrace. "I love you, too."

 _But you stopped them. I knew you would_.

"That's me," she says, and bows her head low; he smiles when she kisses him and the lost time of the last year's a promise in the curve of his lips on hers. "Always saving the world."


	30. fault lines

_(prompt request: "a kiss... as a promise." Post-Nathema.)_

 **fault lines**

Some nights are easier than others.

Her nightmares didn't stop with Valkorion gone. She'd never thought they would, of course. He was never the only thing crawling inside her head, too many half-heard whispers and too many old wounds ripped open too many times to ever be able to fully heal; she closes her eyes and sees Hunter grinning as she picks shards of glass from her skin, sees Revan on his knees and the light of Ziost fading through a space station window and Vaylin screaming, her face contorted in helpless fury, and some nights, like tonight, she remembers all the way back to the beginning of all of it and sees the _Dominator_ , her hand on the button and she needs to just _push_ it, stupid girl, it would buy them the time they need to capture Jadus but no, she can't, she can't do it, Dromund Kaas is her _home_ -

"It's okay." Theron's voice cuts through the dream-fog, his hands wrapped around her wrists as she startles awake. (She lashes out, otherwise, a dangerous habit born of years spent reaching under pillows for hidden knives when someone woke her unexpectedly. The knife isn't there, now; she doesn't need it these days. But after the third time she almost broke his nose they settled on this as a compromise. She won't let herself hurt him.

She won't let anything hurt him any more.

He has nightmares too, she knows, especially now. But he isn't quite ready to talk about them yet- barely two weeks since she brought him home from Nathema and only two days out of the infirmary, he still shakes his head and goes quiet when she asks- and so she lets it be.) "It's okay, Nine," he murmurs again. "I'm here."

She opens her eyes.

 _Bed._

 _Theron._

 _Home._

She exhales. "I'm sorry. Did I wake you up again?"

"I was awake." When she flexes her hands he relaxes his grip, though he keeps his arms around her and his face nestled into her neck as she curls tighter against him, her back against his chest. "Sleep cycle's still fucked up. Bad dream?"

"Yeah."

The bandage on his stomach scratches against her bare skin. "My fault?"

"No." Stars, don't let him start down that road again- she forgives him, she _forgives_ him but she doesn't think he's forgiven himself yet; he's been holding himself together, keeping the facade up, but the cracks in it get a little broader every day. She turns over until she's facing him, until she can look at him eye to eye. "A long, long time ago- years before we met. Before I was a Cipher, even."

He nods. "But you remember it."

"I wish I didn't," she says, shifting; he cradles her face between his hands. "It would have been easier if I didn't have my memory then, too. I knew what I had to do but I couldn't. I froze. Blew the whole op."

"What would have happened if you'd done-" he pauses. They've never really talked that far back. She can't remember half of what happened in those days, and the half she can…well, it isn't the good half- "whatever it was?"

"We'd have captured the target, and I'd have killed about a million people, give or take a few hundred thousand." She shrugs. "So I let him escape. They made me a Cipher for it and then put me in Castellan restraints. Just in case it ever happened again."

Theron blinks, then presses his forehead against hers. "I love you, you know."

"I love you, too. Though that's not quite what I expected you to say. What-" She brings her hand up along his back, fingertips brushing the outline of every rib- oh, he's so thin now- and she loses the rest of the thought in the hollows beneath his eyes.

He's here now. He will get better. _They_ will get better.

(Won't they?)

"I hated them so much," he whispers after a minute's silence. "The first time I saw them all without the cloak-and-dagger shit, masks off, out in the open… they talked about you like you were the worst kind of monster. And they expected me to agree. I hadn't seen Marcus Trant in almost five years and you know what the first thing he said to me was?"

She shakes her head and holds him tighter.

"He said-" Theron presses his lips together into a hard line before he keeps going- "he said, ' _And I thought_ my _ex was a bitch. At least you finally came to your senses_.' I almost punched him and turned around and left."

"But you didn't."

"I couldn't. I promised you I'd do whatever it took to keep you safe."

She frowns. "I know, but-"

"I _promised_." He's fierce for a moment, even in exhaustion, even in pain. "No matter what. I hated every minute of it. I hated myself. But if you made it through, if you beat them, it'd all be worth it no matter what happened to me."

"Don't say that."

He presses his mouth to the bridge of her nose. "It's true."

"It isn't. Don't ever say that. If you'd-" She closes her eyes; her eyelids are heavy and she blinks, fighting away sleep as it tries to drag her down again, focusing on him. Sleep can wait. This can't. "They almost killed you, Theron. Don't ever say that again. Please. "

"I-"

"Promise me."

He kisses her, then, and she can feel the mask shatter in the seconds before the first tears fall. "I promise," he says. His lips taste of salt when he kisses her again; she isn't sure, after the third kiss, whether the damp tracks down her cheeks are his doing or hers but it doesn't matter now, does it? He's home, he's home, he's _home_ \- "I promise."


	31. you've got this

( _prompt request: "a kiss... for luck." Nine/Theron. NSFW.)_

 **you've got this**

"You've got this," Theron says for probably the tenth time in an hour as he turns away from the shuttle's controls to look at her. "It's going to be fine."

Nine ignores him and keeps pacing. She's been on edge all morning- Valkorion's doing, as per usual. The mission's straightforward enough, a quick run on an outpost with Theron slicing her a path in and out, but since Arcann's escape and Vaylin's ascension the voice in her head's been a little louder every day, his patience thinner and his insults more pointed; her nerves are stretched wire-taut, the tension in her body humming so loud that some days she thinks it must be audible.

Rationally, she could run this op in her sleep with one hand tied behind her back. But-

Counting helps a little, the repetition a marginal distraction. (Drinking helps a little more, but that's a line she won't cross, not in the field.) So she walks back and forth, back and forth, counting her steps as she traverses the bridge until finally she turns around and Theron's standing in her path with his arms folded across his chest.

"It's going to be fine," he says again as she nearly collides with him, reaching out to take her by both wrists. "Talk to me."

"I know it will." She makes a face but stops her pacing. His hands slide up her bare skin- she hasn't even finished getting dressed yet, still in her undershirt with her jacket draped over a nearby chair but they've still got half an hour to go and it's not like he or Lana care, anyway- to wrap around her shoulders and pull her in close. "Unfortunately for me-" she glances toward the still-shut cabin door; the two of them monopolized it far too often and Lana needed rest so they'd given her the luxury of privacy today- "I'm not any good at meditation, and someone's decided now's the perfect time to revisit the various and sundry ways I've fucked up this week. Apparently there have been quite a few."

Theron frowns. "Again?"

"I'm used to it." She shrugs, leaning forward against his chest. "It's just interrupting my prep routine, that's all."

"Can I help?" His lips brush across her forehead and the noise in her head recedes.

"You can do that again."

"Hm. I think I can do one better," he murmurs. Her hair's pinned up already; he knows better than to muss it but the pressure of his fingers on the nape of her neck eases the tension from her muscles and makes her head tilt back, lifts her chin up to bring her mouth level with his.

For a moment her mind quiets, the only noises external- the hum of the engine and the soft in-and-out of Theron's breath, the little happy sound he makes as he feels her relax against his body. With her thoughts her own she can finally, finally focus on something, even if it's only this-

(Not _only_ , not even close to the right word. To say _only_ would be to diminish it. She might as well say only air, only water, only gravity, as though she could survive without those any more than she could without him.)

"Again," she says, and winds her arms around his waist.

He grins. "Kisses for luck?"

"I don't need luck." Her teeth catch his lower lip, nipping sharp until he hisses and digs his nails along the edges of her spine. They don't have time for this, not really. But she needs grounding, needs to center herself, and if this it what it takes sometimes to drive the noise away he doesn't seem to mind. "I have you."

"You do. You always do." A pause, grip shifting down to the curve of her hips, and then- "Where-"

She lets her own hands wander in counterpoint. "Not the cabin. 'fresher?"

"Not much room-" the end of it's a shape of a word against her neck. He lifts her up like it's nothing, already moving, the door to the little space sliding open- "but-"

"Don't need room. Need-"

They didn't need room on Yavin either, after all. All they need is just enough space to stand and something to brace against, their bodies still mostly clothed save for half-lowered trousers; Theron's hand presses tight over her mouth so she can be as loud as she pleases when they fuck, the last of her tension vented in muffled cries into his cupped palm, and he bites into her shoulder hard enough to bruise- she likes it, the marks he leaves on her, she's told him so, and even if she hadn't he can read it in the arch of her back and the way she comes, quick and gunshot-sharp once and then again and then again as he shudders and breathes her name against her swollen skin.

"Is that for luck, too?" She looks back at him, kisses his forehead before he has a chance to move away, and he opens his eyes and laughs and nips at her opposite shoulder with a flick of his tongue that makes her squirm.

"Call it incentive," he says. "I know how you are about symmetry, but you're not getting the other one until tonight."

 _Oh, you-_

She grins. "Well, then. I suppose I've got this after all."


	32. (but i won't do that)

( _prompt request: a kiss... for luck. Theron POV. Copero._

 _as in previous prompts, the moral of the story may occasionally be_ be careful what you ask for.)

 **(but I won't do that)**

He isn't getting anywhere with Zenta.

What intel she's shared so far has come in scraps and fragments, all verifiable but barely enough to keep that lunatic Atrius from frothing at the mouth, and for his part he's got precious little left to broker in return that won't actually hurt the Alliance. He's done enough damage as it is- Nine's holomessage, cast wide across the 'Net, was proof enough of that.

(Theron doesn't dare keep a copy on his ship's mainframe where the GEMINI unit might find it. Instead he uploaded it into his implant where he can let it play as often as he wants, an overlay to his own senses, a memory and a penance all in one. It hurts, still, to hear her voice.

It should. If someday it doesn't-)

He should have known better than to think this would be easy. If it had been House Mitth still in charge on Copero he could have sweetened the deal with credits but the Inrokini had beaten them to it; with the Eighth Family in her pocket, even if no one admits it publicly, he's not sure that Zenta _needs_ anything at all. In the weeks since he arrived he's ransacked the entire Inrokini database, including the encrypted parts- their security was good but not that good- but the map isn't there.

He needs her datapad.

He needs a better plan.

* * *

She's running late from her previous meeting but waves him into her office as the guards step aside to let him through. (He's already ruled out breaking into her office. Decryption was one thing, but he isn't blasterproof.)

"Theron Shan." He still can't read her smile properly. "Excellent timing. My brother was just speaking of you."

"My visions don't lie, Inrokini'zenta'alani. You know that." Valss paces back and forth across the woven rug in front of the carved wooden desk. "If we don't help him you're going to-"

Her jaw tenses. "We'll continue this discussion later. Leave us."

Valss turns abruptly on his heel and strides out of the office, looking back over his shoulder at him as he goes. The door shuts behind him; Zenta unclenches her fists, her knuckles cracking audibly.

"I'm very fond of him," she murmurs, "and he is correct that his visions have never been wrong. But sometimes I wish his mother had smothered him in the cradle. It would save me a great deal of aggravation."

He doesn't reply. He isn't meant to; he's learned that much, at least.

"Now-" Zenta gestures to the vacant chairs in the far corner- "shall we pick up where we left off yesterday?"

* * *

The knock on the door of the guest suite is so soft he almost misses it beneath the sound of her voice.

 _This is the Commander of the Eternal Alliance. This message is for my husband-_

The second knock, louder, breaks him out of his reverie, and he pauses the message as he checks his blasters and then moves to check the viewscreen. He isn't expecting visitors. Outright murder isn't precisely Ascendancy style but-

"Theron Shan?" A male voice. When he activates the screen Valss- oh, Void, it's- he's hopeless at Chiss names, he'd have thought it'd be Inrokini'valss'something but that wasn't it, he doesn't think- "It's important that we speak. May I come in?"

His lightsaber's clipped to his belt, his hands empty. If it's a ruse, it's a good one. Theron takes a deep breath. "Yeah. Sure."

He opens the door. "I'm sorry," he says, to start with- might as well be honest- "it's Valss, I know, but your formal name is-"

"Don't worry about that. I don't mind the informality." Valss moves a few steps into the room. "Though I'd ask you not to mention that to my sister."

"My lips are sealed."

His smile, unlike Zenta's, touches his eyes. At this distance he's younger than Theron had thought; if the syndic was Theron's age he might be ten years their junior, with high cheekbones and skin unmarked by worry lines. (Or that might be the Force at play, of course. He's known a great many Jedi who could pass for decades younger than their birth records would suggest, his mother included.) "Oh, good."

Words trailing off into silence, the pause lingers awkward between them until Theron clears his throat. "You said you needed to speak with me."

"Yes," Valss says. "Apologies. I was considering how to begin. I don't-" he pauses, makes a face- "I'm permitted to speak to very few people. Even fewer when it pertains to my visions."

"I'm not Force-sensitive." Will that ever not hurt to say? "But I'm familiar with the concept."

"I'll be plain, then. I dreamed about you last night."

* * *

"She's afraid," Valss says over the rim of his glass. "She doesn't trust you."

Theron shrugs. The whiskey here's surprisingly good, smooth going down with just a gentle burn on the back of his tongue, and he rolls it slowly around his mouth before he swallows. "Can't fault her for that. I probably wouldn't trust me, either."

"She has to. She'll die if she doesn't, and your success is certain."

"You say that like it's carved in stone."

The gesture he gets in reply isn't familiar. "I've never been wrong, though there have been many times when I'd rather have been. All I know is that the people hunting you will come here, too late to prevent you from finding what it is you seek. But in my dream my sister would not help you. She fought a woman in red who moved like a ghost and the ghost struck her down."

He closes his eyes, trying to picture Nine, and all he can see is the the holo: her hair charred and chopped short, angry bruises on her face and her eyes swollen with unshed tears. _That's my girl_ , he thinks, _still fighting._

"I don't always agree with Zenta." When Theron looks at him again Valss is frowning and for a second he wonders if he can read his thoughts, but no, he's lost in his own head, staring past Theron out the window toward the sea. "But I do not want her to die."

"Do you know what the timeline is?" He takes another sip of whiskey. "Until I'm found?"

"No. It's not an exact science."

Another sip.

"I'll speak to her again in the morning." Rising, Valss sets his glass on the table between them; a bead of condensation rolls slowly down its side to settle on the mosaic tiles beneath. "She'll see reason. She has to."

* * *

 _-we can end the cycle of war, Theron. You have a hundred ships waiting for your command, to use as you see fit. But I need you to-_

(Her voice broke, then.

His heart breaks with it, every time.)

* * *

The old Alliance arms cache on Hoth is almost abandoned now, with the Star Fortress long destroyed and their foothold there no longer needed.

He hopes so, at least. He gives up the location to Zenta the next day when she asks about heavy weaponry; it buys him another week.

* * *

"It would help me reason with her-" Valss says a few days later; these meetings have become routine now, as much so as his daily conferences with the syndic- "if you'd tell me why you need the map."

Theron sighs, slouching lower in his chair. "I'm sure it would." Telling him about the map, even in the vaguest possible sense, was probably stupid. All his instincts keep telling him Valss' motives are genuine- even if it's only to keep Zenta alive he seems to truly want to help and he's got to use that however he can- but the last thing he wants is word of the Order's goal getting back to the Chiss. Some of them might think it was a good idea and he's not giving that beast any more fodder beyond himself. Time to change the subject. "Why is she hesitating? She clearly values your gift, but-"

Valss blinks. "Wait. Say that again."

"Which part? Why is she-"

"No." His smile is radiant. "Gift. You called it a gift."

Theron nods slowly. Master Zho had always used the word- gifted in the Force, he'd said, as though one day he'd wake and it'd be there, wrapped up beneath the Life Day tree. "You can see the future. I think most people'd call it that."

"Not my people. For us the Force is…" Valss leans forward toward him. "By the standards of the Ruling Families I am considered defective. Unworthy. They exile us, drug us. The mountains of Csilla are full of the bones of children like me."

"But you survived."

"By chance. I had my first vision just after Zenta's father died. My own family wanted me medicated and shut away, but Zenta needed every advantage she could get to hold onto power- against all advice she adopted me into her House. By calling me brother, she put me near enough to her that my safety was assured." A shadow falls across his face as the light fades from the window, Copero's sun falling below the horizon. "Insofar as that's possible, and only as long as she survives. But if she's seen to rely on me too much, that also makes her vulnerable. Do you see?"

Oh.

He considers his next words carefully.

"When I was a child," he says, "I was raised to believe that if I worked hard enough, if I meditated often enough, that the Force was my birthright. When that turned out to be a lie, I didn't have a place in that world. So I'm sorry if I offended you. I only-"

"You didn't offend me." Valss hesitates a moment before reaching out, resting one of his hands carefully on top of Theron's. "You understand."

He's reading too much into it. He's reading too much into it. It's just a gesture (don't be _stupid_ it isn't just a gesture the Chiss don't touch _anyone_ but what- oh, _Void_ -)

Theron turns his arm, slow and deliberate, until Valss' hand sits in the curve of his palm; he waits.

"And I understand-" skin on skin, fingers curling- "why I was meant to help you."

* * *

(He asked her about it once, after enough time had passed that the hurt of it had faded into memory and the question became academic rather than personal.

It takes her almost five minutes to answer.

 _How do you do it?_ She sits up on the bed, arms wrapped around her knees. _Like anything else, I suppose. I was taught. How did they teach you to kill?_

He starts to respond and she shakes her head gently.

 _That was rhetorical. It's… Theron, why are you asking me this?_

 _I love you._ He shifts until he's curled around her, head beside her hip, looking up at her. _And I want to understand._

She nods. _I love you, too. I- think of it like this. Did you ever walk into your office and realize you have no memory of how you got there- that you left your apartment and made all the correct turns, traveled the correct streets, but you were so busy thinking about something else that your body went through the motions while your mind was a thousand parsecs away?_

 _All the time._

 _You just-_ she lets one hand fall, combing idly through his hair. _It's the same. It's just sex. Your body knows what to do so you think about the mission, about a film you enjoy, about an old lover- anything but what you're doing. And you tell yourself that it's necessary._

 _But-_

 _It sounds awful. I know that. But it's what they made me._

He raises up to kiss the bare skin along her ribs. _I know. I know. I just don't think I could ever have done it._

 _I said that once, too. But you never know how far down you're willing to go until you're already falling, I think._

 _Very poetic of you_. He kisses her again, lower, on the arch of her hip, and she sighs through the words and leans into his mouth. _I'm sorry. Come here._ )

* * *

(She was right.

Of course she was.

He's a traitor, after all, and he's already fallen so very, very far that it only makes sense that his body is, too.)

* * *

A listening post sacrificed. Another week bought. He sleeps alone, still, when night comes. That's a line he will not cross. But-

 _I love you, Theron,_ she says inside his head. _Come home._

He's no longer certain whether he deserves to.

* * *

"You don't have to agree." Theron shoves the last of his few belongings into his rucksack, slinging it over this shoulder. "I know it's asking far too much."

With a shake of his head Valss turns, considering the still-closed door and the commotion beyond. "If I don't go now we won't have another chance. They're coming, Theron, and if I can't save Zenta at least I can save you."

He closes his eyes. This wasn't how it was meant to go.

"Ten minutes and I'll be back with the datapad. I know where Zenta keeps it, and by the time she knows it's gone we'll be halfway to your map."

"All right." He exhales and then breathes in sharply at the pressure of Valss' kiss. "What-"

"You don't need luck," Valss says as he opens his eyes again. "But I do."


	33. milestone

**milestone (or, a portrait of a marriage)**

She opens her eyes and she swears, just for a second, that she can hear his voice.

Fucking sleeping pills. She hates them. They blur the line between dreams and waking until it's hard to tell the difference, and though the worst nightmares are gone since Valkorion's final death she still dreams every night, retracing paths through old memories she wishes she could forget. But since that day on Umbara she hasn't had much choice- it was either the sleeping pills or no sleep at all.

She's no use if she isn't sleeping. No one says it, but she knows it's true. Even with stims, after a few days awake she's snappish, sloppy, starts missing details; they can't afford to miss a single thing, not now, not this close to what might be the end of it. So she makes faces at Lana- dear, dear Lana, such a _nag_ but someone's got to make her take care of herself if Theron isn't here to do it- and makes a show of taking the pill, set on her tongue and washed down with water, a nightly ritual.

What other choice is there? She's no use if she isn't sleeping.

(Is she any use at all any more? She doesn't know.

The whispers in the corridors get louder every day. _We should have found them by now. What's taking so long?_

 _You know what'll happen when we do. How hard do you really think she's looking, when-_ )

But oh, stars, she wakes up curled around a pillow and it's like he's right there beside her, soft words whispered in her ear as the fog of sleep lifts.

"Good morning, sweetheart. Wake up."

It's him. Either it's him or she's finally lost it completely- equally likely possibilities these days. She turns, shoving the pillow aside, but save for rumpled sheets the bed is empty and she bunches up her fists, sits up and-

No, not entirely empty. Her holo's there, half-buried beneath the blanket- she'd been going through her messages when the pill finally kicked in and it must have fallen from her hand- and there he is, smiling, just as she remembers; she catches up the device, frantic, and lifts it to face height.

"Theron? Theron, are you-?"

His expression doesn't change and his hair's the way she remembers it, too, not the way it looks now with pale scalp exposed (though not so pale now, probably, with months passed since their last meeting- he took after his father, there, skin deepening to brown with the slightest sun. Not like her, pink and blistered; she fared far better in the dark.) A recording, then? But why?

"Wake up," he says again, gentle. "If you're hearing this, then I'm-"

No. No.

 _NO_

 _please let that not be what this is, oh, no-_

"-then I'm sorry, and I'm probably going to have a lot of making up for things to do whenever I finally make it back to you." _Not dead._ Her heart starts beating again. "But it must be important, whatever I'm doing, to keep me away from you on our anniversary."

Anniversary.

It is, isn't it? Officially it was still two weeks away; regardless of the date on the formal certificate, though, that was never going to be the one they celebrated privately. Binding or not, their little ceremony on Rishi had been a year ago today.

"Hopefully you're not hearing this at all." Theron leans forward, sitting on- a bed, she thinks, but not this one, not the one they're supposed to be sharing, not the one he should be in right now, curled up beside her. "Hopefully you'll never hear this and we're waking up together and I'll give you a kiss and tell you look beautiful and-"

She misses the last phrase, ears full of her own low keening, and she can't read his lips if she can't see properly- only sleepy, still, bleary-eyed, not crying, certainly not-

He sits up a little straighter. "I'm sorry if I'm not making sense. I don't even know what time it is but I can't sleep and I know it's tradition to have couples spend the night before a wedding apart, but that's a really stupid tradition and-" he takes a deep breath, rubs his forehead and focuses on the camera again. "I can't sleep without you, now, I so I've recorded a few of these to fill the time… birthday, anniversary, just because. Messages for you if I can't be there. Maybe I'll delete them later. I don't know."

(He had looked tired that day. But it was such a long day, so much ritual and ceremony, nearly an hour spent simply standing as people filed past, bowing or curtseying, until they'd finally shut themselves in an antechamber to gulp down a half-dozen little hors d'oeuvres before they fainted from hunger- she hadn't had time to think about it, really.

She hadn't known about any of this.

She wishes she'd never had to find out.)

"At least I'll have more time to think about a present." Shaking his head slightly, Theron makes a face; she reaches out one fingertip and it goes through the projection as she knew it would, but if she could just touch him, just for a moment- "I just spent half an hour looking that up on the 'net and there are all kinds of rules, apparently. Year one: paper or a clock." He holds up a datapad. "I'm going to have to do better than that, I think."

She shakes her head. Forget presents, forget celebration. Him, home, would be enough.

"I love you, sweetheart. I'll be home soon. And I promise that however long I've been away-" _six months, Theron, six months and no end to this in sight. Did he know, even then, that this would happen?_ "I promise I'll make it up to you the moment I get there. Happy anniversary. I'll see you soon."

The recording ends, his picture frozen; she curls back onto her side, still holding the holo tight in one hand.

She should do something. She should- has this been on her holo all along, or did he just send it because if he did then she should look at the file more closely, try to trace it even though she knows there won't be anything to find-

She should do something.

She should do something other than lay here, crying, rewinding the recording- but that's for later. For now, she presses play.

"Good morning, sweetheart," Theron says.

"Good morning," she whispers back. "Happy anniversary."

* * *

 _(ten minutes earlier)_

Ten relays, six address masks. A private network, carefully hidden. It should be enough.

It's a bad idea. If it's intercepted-

It should be enough.

He presses send.

 _Happy anniversary. I'll see you soon_.


	34. rules

_(prompt request: "a drunken kiss")_

 **rules**

She's not sure what she expected from a Rishi hotel, honestly.

They could have slept shipboard like they always did; that had been the plan, but their docking platform was on the opposite side of Raider's Cove and with everyone in the bar buying them congratulatory drinks neither she nor Theron were in any shape to make the long walk back at the end of the night. More to the point, he takes her hand as they step out into the street, pulling her toward the little hotel on the far side of the magistrate's office.

"Come on." When he lifts her up into his arms he wobbles a little and they both laugh at the simple stupid joy of it; for all their years of second-guessing this is right and they know it and that too, makes them laugh and cling harder to each other. "Let's do this properly."

The wreath of bright flowers tilts to one side, a dangling curl of vine brushing her ear, as she straightens the matching bloom pinned to the lapel of his red jacket. If not for the adornments it might have been any night at all, the two of them in their usual armor as the world keeps moving around them. "We might be a little late for that."

They sign the guest ledger, matching scrawls, because no one's going to read it and no one would believe them, anyway- _Empress Nyriala of Zakuul, First of Her Name_ and _Theron Shan, Consort to Her Imperial Majesty_ \- and they take the key from the half-sleeping clerk and together stumble up the stairs.

Stars, this mattress is terrible.

She tips backward onto the bed regardless, laughing, reaching out for him, and when her head hits the pillow the room spins around her in dizzy circles.

"I think," she mutters, blinking, "I might be slightly drunk."

"Nope. Not possible." Theron falls over beside her, brushes a loose petal off the bridge of her nose. "You're perfect."

"Flatterer." Head turning, her mouth brushes across his still-outstretched hand, along the thin silver band still unfamiliar around his finger. In a few more weeks it'll be something different, the ones they'd already chosen for themselves waiting in carved boxes in their quarters; for now, it's there, a twin to her own, a tactile reminder of every promise they've ever made and most especially this one- _you, forever_ -

He nods agreement, and if the motion makes him dizzy too he hides it well. "Always. I mean, you're my wife."

It hadn't really sunk in until that moment, she thinks.

(They'd made jokes about it for months, as the complications of the impending Zakuulan ceremony increased exponentially with every passing day; if her unwanted coronation made her sick with stress the damned wedding was giving her hives. She'd delegated much of the work, with Lana's help, to Senya- _I never had a public ceremony,_ Senya said, _but I know how it's meant to go_ \- but still he'd peer over her shoulder at the pages and pages of arrangements and shake his head.

 _We could just elope, you know._

She rolls her eyes. _We might be a little late for that. Chocolate cake, or vanilla?_

But then they walk past the Rishi magistrate's office on their way back from the Trader's Guild and almost collide with a wedding party, two women in matching dresses hand in hand in the doorway dodging thrown flowers and a cascade of well-shaken champagne.

 _Now that looks like fun_. She turns to Theron, who's got one eyebrow raised in an expression she knows to be a particularly dangerous one.

 _Are you thinking_ , he says, _what I'm thinking?_

As it turns out, she was.)

"I love you, you know." She rolls onto her side; they're nose to nose, almost, heads on the same pillow. "Did we really just get married? Or-"

"I love you, too. And I think so- I mean, I don't know how binding it is, but we both said I will at all the right times, right?" He grins when she nods, pulls her in even closer with one arm around her waist. "So I'm pretty sure it counts."

"Good," she says, and tries to wriggle out of her jacket. The bed's narrow, though, and with all her squirming she only succeeds in nearly falling off the edge before Theron hauls her back towards its center. "If we're proper now, then kiss me properly."

His mouth tastes of wine and whiskey and the sweet-frosted cakes they'd shared at the end of the night and-

"Not sure if that's allowed." He bites at her lip and as his forehead brushes hers the pressure sets the wreath askew again, petals falling, catching on her hair and on his eyelashes. "I hear there are rules against this kind of thing when you're married."

"Then you'd better go back downstairs and get us a divorce-" even mouth on mouth and half-undressed it takes him a second to realize she's teasing; she feels him go still and she kisses him again, harder, until the moment passes and he sighs, content, and eases into her touch- "because if I can't do this any more-"

"You know," he gasps, "I was never much for rules."


	35. dawn

_(prompt request: "a kiss out of habit")_

 **dawn**

"Mama." Ysa calls out from her room, a plaintive whine. "Mama, help."

She opens her eyes with a soft groan. It's so cold outside and the bed is warm and Theron's warmer; she curls into his arms as he stirs awake, too.

"I'll get up," he murmurs. "It's my turn."

That is, she thinks, an excellent point. It is his turn and it's early yet, only the smallest hints of dim grey light slanting through the far window and snow still falling in the courtyard beyond; she can see the flakes in the near-dark, if only barely, but more than that she can feel it in a nagging soft ache in her shoulder, in her spine, all the old injuries her body can't quite manage to forget. Beneath the blankets it's easier. But-

Ysa keeps crying, pitch creeping upward little by little- _mama, mama-_ and then a fierce _doggie, no!_ with all the toddler sternness possible in a vocabulary limited to half a hundred words. When Theron starts to sit up, starts to fold the blankets back over her body, she nudges them back toward him.

"She wants me," she says, wriggling out of the pile of quilts. "And you heard that. She's trying to climb out. Again."

Theron reaches out for her hand, catching her fingertips with his and pulling her back down. "Natural-born escape artist. Can't imagine where she gets that from."

Her grin punctuated by a wide yawn, she lets herself fall over beside him; head on the pillow beside his once more, she turns toward him to catch him in a lazy kiss. It's a habit they have: going to bed, getting up, leaving or coming home, ever since he came back to her after Nathema and he'd wake up clinging to her like he couldn't quite believe she was real, like she might crumble into dust if he let go, even for a moment-

(She always knew, somehow, that he'd come home.

But there were times, he told her more than once- on so many nights when his nightmares wouldn't let him sleep they just lay together instead, speaking the worst of their secrets into the silent dark and letting it carry them away to wither out of consequence in the light of the morning that came after- that he didn't think he'd live that long.)

 _Kiss me,_ she'd say and he'd lean in with a teasing grin, or she'd steal up behind him just loud enough to give the game away and when he turned to catch her she'd laugh and claim her prize, or he'd bend down to meet her as she sat in the courtyard with her face turned up to the warm sun. It's a habit they have, and this morning his kiss doesn't mean _don't go_ or _see you soon_ or _be safe._ It simply means _I love you,_ sleepy and sweet and gentle, and she smiles against his mouth.

"You, I expect." She kisses his nose, too, just because. "I'm sure I was perfectly well-behaved as a child."

"I never climbed out of any cribs."

Hard to believe, frankly, given his tendency to climb, perch, or hang upside down from anything in easy reach, although- "Did you ever have a crib to climb out of?"

"Semantics."

Ysa calls out again, then, and Theron leans off the side of the bed, grasping blindly at something; after a moment he drops something fabric- her shirt or his, she can't quite tell in the dark- on her head and she blinks and reaches up to take it.

"I'll find something else to put on," he says, "while you get her."

She climbs across him, off the bed and toward the bedroom door, and slips her hands into the shirt (his- last night's T-shirt still smelling faintly of his cologne; she inhales out of reflex, breathing him in) as she moves. "She needs to learn to stay in bed. This is the third-"

One last howl. She winces.

"Never mind." The floor's a comfort under her bare feet, at least, the heat beneath it an expense that had paid for itself in the first few weeks of winter. "We'll be back in a moment."

Already halfway sitting up, Theron mutters something that's probably agreement as she steps out into the corridor. When she gets near enough to Ysa's room, just around the corner from theirs, she can hear her still fussing, babbling animatedly over the noise of muted claws on padded floor. Peering into the room, she folds her arms across her chest.

"Ysa? What are you-"

She can't quite see her daughter, only two small hands pressed firmly against the snout of a very aggrieved-looking akk dog, and at the sound of her voice Pinky (they'd tried to argue that the dog was red, really, but Ysa'd insisted, and she supposes one could call that color pink if one squinted) turns back toward the door with an expression that could only be interpreted as _I Am Trying To Keep Small Squishy Thing From Falling, Larger Squishy Thing, But You See What I Have To Deal With_ and a short, soft whine.

(Since it appeared in the courtyard a month ago the dog had hardly left Ysa's side. All her Holonet searches had done was confirm that yes, akk dogs are Force-sensitive and yes, they do bond with people and there was likely going to be very little any of them could do about it beyond figure out what to feed it and where it was going to sleep.

She'd even called the Corellian Zoological Society- anonymously, of course. The akk dog keeper, Void take the man, only laughed and wished her luck.)

Nine sighs and scratches behind its ears. "I've got her, pup. Go lie down."

With a _whuff,_ Pinky does, backing away from the crib to curl up on the huge cushion in the corner of the room and revealing Ysa, standing up with both hands on the bars and her sleeping-sack in a heap beside her and already trying to lift one chubby leg over the top rail.

"Ysa. No. You're going to hurt yourself."

Her eyes wide, blinking upward- Theron always swears she takes after her but there's no mistaking it; she got that expression from her father- Ysa pauses mid-climb. "Want up."

"It's not time to get up yet, dearest." Even as she says it she moves to intercept her, looping her hands under Ysa's arms and depositing her back on the mattress. She isn't going to win this but she can at least pretend she's not going to give in immediately. "Let's go back to sleep, hm?"

"Mama, no-" that was at least six syllables. She got that one from her father, too. "Up."

She can pretend to be stern, too. "How do we ask?"

"Up please?"

She lifts her back up into her arms and Ysa wraps her arms around her neck, nestling her face into her shoulder with a happy hum that winds her own heart all the tighter around her daughter's tiny fingers. "That's better." Pressing a light kiss to her forehead, she settles her onto her hip. "Shall we go and find your papa?"

"Mm-hm." Already half-asleep again, she thinks.

It's back down the hall and around the corner together, then, step by step until she crosses the threshold of their room and Theron looks up and smiles; he's fixed the blankets in her absence, a little nest in the middle of the bed for all of them to curl up in together, and opened up the curtains to a better view of the falling snow. Sitting up in the blanket-nest, he holds out his arms and she passes Ysa to him before she sits down too.

"Another escape mission, I see." He settles back again, Ysa draped over his chest with a barely audible _hi, papa_ before she's snoring softly. "Successful?"

"Foiled by the dog," she yawns and squirms in beside him, pulling the last blanket over all of them. "But then I was sabotaged by a very convincing _please_."

"She gets that," Theron grins, "from you." His arm around her, he turns his head toward hers for one more kiss before they all fall back to sleep.

An old habit, now. One worth keeping.


	36. army

_(prompt request: "a kiss in relief")_

 **army**

As soon as the engines cut out she darts down toward Theron's little shuttle.

Even in the nebulous hours between _too late_ and _too early_ the launch bay's never quite deserted and with Torch's people laying claim to whatever space they can the chaos is deafening, a cacophony of welding equipment hissing out orange-blue sparks in the dim light, whirring hydraulic lifts and the companionable chirps of astromechs. If she had more dignity she'd walk, slow and measured and in proper control of herself, and greet them all as she moved past. If she had more dignity she wouldn't run.

If she had more dignity-

Oh, fuck it.

The Mandalorians won't care. If their tactics on Darvannis weren't proof enough that she doesn't play by the standard rulebook her impromptu duel had certainly done the trick: apparently it was not usual form to engage the new Mandalore in a one-handed knife fight, _tihaar_ notwithstanding, even if it was the other woman's idea- which it was- and even if the consensus was that Shae had let her win to seal the contract between the Alliance and the clans- which she hadn't; the woman's an absolute monster and she thinks she's got more bruises from the challenge than the Zakuulans' bombs. They are all fighting a war and she feels like maybe they're finally winning and that must have some sort of currency, she thinks. If she has to sacrifice her dignity in order to deal in victories then so be it.

Dignity's overrated anyway.

So she runs. When the loading ramp opens Theron reaches out and she launches herself at him, laughing as he pulls her in close.

"Hail the conquering hero." He's teasing her, words dancing off his tongue- she's no hero and she's told him that a hundred times- but he can't quite mask the worry hiding underneath. "You're okay?"

"I'm fine. I promise. Just a few scratches left after the kolto."

He's pretending she didn't say that; she can tell by the way his breath catches and she draws him down for a kiss until she feels the tension go out of him, giving way to soft relief. "See," he says finally, teasing again, "you didn't need me after all."

She wraps her legs around his waist, her arms around his neck, and he lifts her up and spins her round like dancing (which is one of her very favorite things that he does. It's heavy inside her head sometimes, even in Valkorion's entirely suspicious and entirely welcome absence, but in his arms she flies). "Not true. What about the factory plans you sent?"

"You'd have managed-" between the words she sneaks another kiss and someone whistles so she kisses him once more, just because- "just fine without them. Isn't that what you always say?"

"I do not. And you found us an _army_."

He shrugs. "They're with us because of you. I just got them to show up."

"You're allowed to brag a little bit, you know." And he ought to. Like so many of the galaxy's leaders during the war she slept through, Mandalore the Vindicated fell beneath the swarms of the Eternal Empire's droids and after that the clans fell silent. She'd never have thought to try to drag them back in. But Theron had- and more than that, he'd actually _managed_ it. "You've certainly earned it, even if I wish you'd told me first."

"D'you think so?" When she kisses the bridge of his nose he tilts his chin up a bit, preening- reckless lovely stupid clever boy, Void, she missed him so even if it was only few weeks spent apart- before finally setting her back down on the ramp. He doesn't let her go entirely, though, still wrapping her up tight in his arms. "And I know, but it was supposed to be a surprise."

She squints at him. "Flowers would be a surprise. Chocolates."

"That stuff's for amateurs." His fingers trace the remnants of a bruise along her cheekbone, one last faint reminder of the now-demolished artillery. "Only the best for my girl."

"Like an army."

"Like an army."


	37. worry tokens

_(prompt request: dozens of kisses pressed all over, cheeks, eyelids, temples, brow, nose, lips, alternating between hard and gentle, playful, reassuring, affectionate)_

 **worry tokens**

 _23 ATC. A month, give or take, after Zildrog's fall. Theron POV._

He's asleep when he hears it the first time.

Nine's curled on her side when he startles awake, eyes open and distant and staring straight through him, her pupils huge in the near-dark of their bedroom. (He knows that look too well, though he'd almost forgotten it after Valkorion's fall in those almost-peaceful months where they'd held fast and ferocious to their joy in each other, when they'd thought the worst was over and only better things to come-

-and part of him knows that this time its return is because of him. Of the things he's done in this past year, that might be the very worst one of all.)

She blinks; he hears the noise again, not from her mouth- her lips are still, her breath moving in and out in that odd near-silent way she has that he could never quite manage to learn. It takes him a moment to trace it to its source, her right hand clinging tight to one corner of the pillowcase, worrying at it rhythmically as the cotton fabric rustles between her fingertips in a way that reminds him, just a little, of the sound of a knife being drawn.

( _You're paranoid, Shan_ , he tells himself. But he'd spent so long spent forcing himself not to flinch at every shadow, every sound, every sidelong glance in his direction when any of that pack of madmen mentioned her name because he had no other choice: one fuckup, one single moment of regret visible on his face and it'd have been over for both of them. So he'd buried it deep, all of his rage and fear and grief and hardest and deepest of all how much he loved her, letting it all gnaw at him from the inside out- figuratively and literally; by the end he was downing handfuls of antacid tablets with his caf. _No more blades in the dark. That's over now. It's over and she's safe._

If he says it often enough he can make himself believe it's true.)

"Nine?"

She doesn't answer, though her eyes snap back into focus for a moment, and then shivers.

"Nine." Shifting, Theron reaches down toward the foot of the bed to where she's kicked the blankets away, pulls them up and over her until she's covered. "Sweetheart, talk to me."

Still nothing beyond another flicker of a glance toward him. He sighs and slips his fingers into the gap between hers, forcing a pause in the pattern of their movement that finally breaks her focus. Eyes closing, Nine exhales for what seems like forever. "I'm fine," she whispers, hand wrapping around his and gripping tight. "Go back to sleep."

"No, you aren't." Last year he would have teased her- _for a Cipher you're a terrible liar, punctuated with a kiss_ \- but she's still too brittle for that. Instead he kisses her eyelids, one and then the other; her lashes flutter against his lower lip. "What's on your mind?"

"It's nothing. It's stupid."

One arm threading beneath her, he pulls her in toward him until her head settles on his pillow. Her skin is warm despite her shivering, her pulse steady against his chest, and when he rests his other hand on the small of her back she curls into him out of pure reflex and makes a little soft sad noise that pierces sliver-sharp into his heart. "Tell me."

She shakes her head.

"Please," he says, the word a brush of his mouth against her forehead. "I know that look. Stupid or not, whatever it is is eating you up. Talk to me."

Her eyes open; her mouth twists. "Promise me you won't be angry."

"You know I won't." He won't. He doesn't have any right to be, not now.

Nine curls in tighter against him, silent for another long moment, before she starts to speak again and the words all come out in a rush. "When you trapped me in the train on Umbara, you said- you said I was corrupt. Rotten. A symbol of oppression. Did they tell you to say those things, Theron, or did you think of them yourself?"

(They promised not to lie. Not to each other.) "I had to say what they wanted to hear. It wasn't a script, no, but I had to-" he swallows hard- "it had to be convincing. They needed to believe that I believed that."

"But the words were yours."

"I-"

"Do you know," she says quietly, face turned toward the ceiling, "I wished you'd shot me instead? I wished you'd just shot me and I wouldn't have had to hear those words. I wouldn't still hear them in my head in the middle of the night and wonder what you saw in me that made you think of them. I wouldn't wonder if there was a part of you that believed what you said- a part of me that believed what you said, that maybe you were right all along-"

He needs her to look at him. He needs her to look at him but he doesn't want to let go of her so he nudges her cheek with his, insistent enough to make her turn her head so he can catch her mouth with his and kiss the words away into silence. He never meant- Force, he should have known better than to think she could endure only because she'd done it for so long. "None of it was true, Nine. None of it-" no, no, that's not right; he corrects himself carefully- "except for one thing."

She makes a noise against his mouth, a wordless question, and he kisses her again and again, a hundred kisses scattered on her perfect face, on her forehead and her eyelids and the bridge of her nose, along the arches of her cheekbones and the line of her scar, the curve of her jaw and the bow of her lip. A kiss for every word he hadn't meant, for every wound she didn't deserve, for every day they'd been apart. It isn't enough, but it's a start.

"I told you I love you. Do you remember that?"

Nine nods, repeating his words back like a recording, even the tone a perfect mimic of his own. "'You know I love you… but this is bigger than us.' I remember."

"That was the true thing. Every single other word was a lie." One more kiss, hand in her hair, a reassurance as she clings to him- he thinks she knew it already, but-

"See?" Her voice trembles. "I know. I know. I love you, too. I told you it was stu-"

He steals the words again. "Shh. Come here."


	38. last dance

_prompt request: a press of lips to knuckles, a hand clasped in the other, a courtly gesture of respect and admiration, perhaps segueing into a dance, staring into each others eyes, drinking in the emotion_

 **last** **dance**

She has been the Empress of Zakuul- Nyriala, First of Her Name (granted, they'd all been First of Their Names, hadn't they? Valkorion, Arcann, Vaylin- for an empire spanning centuries, it had done so with so very few rulers until these last few years)- for six hours and thirty-seven minutes by the galactic standard clock.

By remarkable coincidence, that is six hours and thirty-seven minutes longer than she would have liked to be an empress of anything at all.

She isn't cut out for this. The endless pleasantries are one thing, half-truths and pretty lies flowing easily off her tongue; she's trained in that since childhood and stars know she's been at longer and duller parties than this one. But they all keep bowing and curtseying and kissing her hand and her head throbs from the noise and the heat, her neck sore from the weight of the heavy golden crown and if this Void-damned ambassador steps on her foot _one_ _more_ _time_ she may very well scream and-

Theron catches her eye as she waltzes past and she can't help but smile.

They've been circling counterpoint to each other around the room for hours, carefully apart, carefully proper. At a distance from him she can keep control of herself- too close, tonight, she might lose herself, pure stupid simple overwhelming joy breaking through the stresses of the evening, let him wrap her up in his arms in sight of everyone and kiss her-

(When the guards had come to escort her back to the celebration she'd come so close to simply throwing the doors of her chambers open and walking into the corridor with him, hand in hand. There was something in her- not someone else's voice, not any more, just a little of her own wickedness- that said forget the rules, they made you Empress and you should do as you please but she'd silenced it more for Theron's sake than hers: she could almost certainly do exactly as she pleased but Theron wasn't supposed to be there, not in the Empress' quarters and certainly not unannounced via secret passage.

They'll have to remedy that tonight, somehow. She doesn't sleep well without him, even on Odessen, and Zakuul will never be her home. Though the war is over its streets and corridors haunt her still, in waking and in sleep, with so many nightmares that she will never, never, never feel safe, not even sitting on its throne. But with Theron beside her it's easier. With Theron beside her everything is easier- then and now, tonight, forever-

Forever. She still can't quite believe it.

His question and her answer were still echoes in the air when her escorts came back to fetch her and after a few last frantic kisses, hair tidied and face powdered and lipstick smudges wiped clean from Theron's mouth, the sparkling pendant- an old tradition, an _Imperial_ tradition and a practical one besides given the size of the gemstone; it would never have fit well beneath her combat gloves- clasped around her throat and tucked carefully into the neckline of her gown, he'd slipped back into the passage.

"I love you, Nine," he'd whispered over the first knock on the outer door. "Save me the last dance?"

She still couldn't even speak properly, every word except yes stripped out of her vocabulary, and she didn't want to let go of his hand. As the panel started to close between then, her fingertips caught his. "Yes," she'd said, again, again, again, until she couldn't hold on any longer, "yes. I love you, too. Yes.")

He returns her smile with a sly little wink as their paths intersect and then he's gone, orbiting back around the room, Only a few more minutes and he'll come around again; she can only hope this interminable song is done by then. She could do with a few minutes' rest.

The pattern of steps begins once more, one last refrain- she knows this one at least, one of the court dances she'd rehearsed with Senya ( _did_ _he_ _ever_ _dance_ , she'd asked mid-twirl, _with_ _you_? Senya only smiled and shook her head). One last circle around the room. One last round of bows and curtsies, nodding to each, trying to keep focus and keep time all at once, nearly missing a step but only nearly. She's practiced far too hard for that.

And then, finally, the music ends.

Her partner practically scrapes the floor before he backs away, effusive in his praise, and she turns to retreat toward her seat. Before she can reach it, only halfway across the ballroom with her guards moving from their posts toward her like flickering shadows in the corners of her eyes, the conductor clears his throat.

"Your Majesty," he calls out, voice amplified enough to be heard over the murmuring crowd, "and honored guests. We beg your indulgence for one final dance."

Theron slips up behind her- she doesn't ever need to see Theron to know it's him; by now she knows his footfalls, knows the way the air stirs and ripples around the shape of his body- and reaches for her hand.

"You did promise," Theron murmurs in her ear, his fingers lacing through hers. Her guards go tense and still until she gestures, a single movement, and they fade back toward their posts. "Dance with me."

"Ask me properly," she says, and turns round toward him. He takes a step backward, shifting but not quite letting go of her, bowing low and graceful as his lips brush her knuckles. "Or I might say no."

He grins and turns her hand in his, another kiss just at the curve of her wrist where her pulse flutters at the edge of the golden cuff (and someone in the crowd saw that, she can hear it in the way the whispers pitch upward). "Empress." Theron glances up, wicked eyes shaded by fluttering lashes- oh, he's awful and it's a mercy she's still standing; she goes quite literally weak when he looks at her like that and it gets her every single time. "May I have the honor of this dance?"

"You may." On sheer impulse she sweeps her other hand across her throat, catching the chain between her fingers and lifting the pendant until the stone reflects the candlelight, brilliant and shimmering-

And everyone in the crowd saw _that;_ Lana's mouth falls open and she clutches frantically at Senya's arm and she's going to owe her an apology later but for now she only sees him.

Slow and sweet and graceful, the first notes of the song fill the air. They take a single step, hand in hand, and then another and another, his arm around her waist and her hand in his, and if the world exists around then for those minutes she couldn't have said as they turn circles together in the center of the room.


End file.
